The Mourning Angel's Tears
by Batteriez Not Included
Summary: Pirate!AU with Pirates of the Caribbean and Assassin's Creed IV elements: Anna was tired of being shut out, ignored, and being considered the spare. So when she meets Gawain, she is given a chance to have adventures she couldn't have otherwise. But when the crew accept a ransom mission that seems to good to be true, they quickly learn that they were not told everything...HIATUS :-(
1. Prologue: Lost and Found

**Hi everyone, BatteriezNotIncluded here! This is my first Fanfic ever, so please go easy on me. Hope you enjoy, I if you have constructive criticism, feel free to PM me, but please don't flame or spam me :-) FYI: I do not own Frozen or the Cover image for this fic. All rights go to Disney and respective owners. **

**Enjoy!**

* * *

Prologue

The door was still closed. Anna had tried virtually everything to get it to open, but it remained stubbornly shut, with her beloved sister telling her to go away. Not that she was getting discouraged, if anything she saw it as a game, a challenge; find the right thing to open the door. So far, chocolate, begging, yelling, and even riding her bike into the door hadn't worked, and she had only succeeded in getting a scolding from her parents, and a concussion. But that didn't mean she was any closer to giving up. Oh no, she was going to get that door open if it was the last thing she ever did. Well, okay not the _last_ thing, the last thing would probably the snowman the built together after the door opened.

Currently, Anna was recovering from a particularly harsh scolding, after an attempt to get the door open involving a suit of armor, bed sheets, cooking oil, and one of the smaller rose bushes from the palace garden. Her ears were still ringing from the yelling, she had received. Of course none of this would have happened if the door had just opened, but it had resulted her getting grounded, which was why the seven year old princess was currently laying on her bed, bored out of her skull.

It was the middle of the night, and nearly everyone in the palace was fast asleep. Anna's stomach rumbled and she decided to sneak into the kitchens to get something to eat. Slowly, she grabbed her bag, snuck out the door, and made her way into the kitchens. She was about half way there when she heard footsteps. Quickly, Anna quietly ducked into the nearest room and shut the door. She slowly backed away from the door and waited for the steps to fade away, and slowly looked around the room.

It was a guest room, with a bed, vanity, nightstand with a candle, and other normal things. What _wasn't_ normal was the large portrait on one of the walls. Anna slowly approached it, her curiosity overruling her hunger. The portrait was of one of the first kings of Arendelle, the painting was surrounded by a large golden frame; the whole thing was just a large as the door. Slowly, Anna touched the painting, and began to feel around the frame. Suddenly she felt a small latch on the underside of the frame. Exited at her discovery, Anna grabbed the chair from the vanity and began to feel around the rest of the edges, and soon found another latch. Carefully, Anna unlatched the painting and it began to swing forward… there was suddenly a loud creak, and Anna quickly shut the painting again. Footsteps suddenly began approaching and Anna quickly hid the first place she could find; under the bed. The footsteps suddenly stopped in front of the door and Anna covered her mouth to keep from getting caught. Slowly the footsteps faded away again and Anna dared to breathe.

Anna carefully got out from under the bed and opened her bag, secretly thankful that she had not emptied it since her attempt to get past _the door_. She quickly opened her bag and began to empty it out; lock picks… small dagger (taken from one of the suits of armor)… hairbrush… a book about Joan of Arc… matches… and… aha! Anna grinned triumphantly as she pulled out the small bottle of cooking oil leftover from her latest break-in attempt. Stuffing everything back into her bag, she quickly went over to the door and oiled the hinges, before carefully reopening the portrait-door. On the other side was…a door. She oiled these hinges as well before trying to open it… locked. Anna quickly went through her bag again and got out her makeshift lock picks. She quickly began to pick the lock on the door, her tongue jutting out slightly as she concentrated. Anna had made the lock-picks herself after reading a locksmithing book in the library when she was bored, and had used her first pair to try to open _the door_. Needless to say it didn't work and the picks had been confiscated, but not before she had managed to make a few backups.

The lock on the door clicked and the door soundlessly swung outward, revealing a small, dark staircase. Anna broke into an earsplitting grin. She had known that the Arendelle palace was bound to have secret passages; she had already found three of them on one of her exploring moods. Barely able to contain her excitement, she grabbed the candle off the nightstand and lit it with her matches, carefully closed the portrait/door behind her, and went down the stairs.

One spiral staircase downward, long winding damp hallway, and straight staircase upward later, Anna stopped, having very nearly hit her head on what appeared to be a cellar door. Slowly she opened it and gasped. From where she was, Anna was in some kind of forest, from where she was she could see the mountains, the fjord and… _wait what?_ Anna wondered frowning, because she was looking at a particular mountain but seeing it at the wrong angle. She had not seen it from this angle before, but she had seen it from the castle windows. She slowly turned her head and let out a yelp, because she was staring at a castle; Arendelle castle… from _outside_ its massive gates. Anna's mind went blank, as a slow brilliant smile spread across her face. She was _out_, she was free! _Oooohhhh_! She realized suddenly, _that's why that tunnel was so damp, it must have been under the fjord_. Looking around, she spotted Arendelle, and she grinned even wider. She carefully took out her dagger and marked the tree next to the hidden door in the ground and carefully closed it, before going toward Arendelle, marking trees as she went.

* * *

Gawain smiled to himself as he brought his hammer down on the strip of hot metal. He was anxious to finish his newest project. Losing himself in his work his mind drifted to his dream. He knew that it would be a long time before he could live his dream, and new that it would only get harder when he started, but his thirst for adventure and freedom was just as powerful if not more so than his hesitation. He dunked the strip of metal, which would be a barrel ring into the water with a hiss. He nearly dropped it into the barrel and realized that it was probably past time to go home and get some sleep. Judging by the moon, it was about one in the morning. He shook his head and carefully closed the blacksmith forge.

Old Man Jackson as he was called had taken in Gawain when he had been nine and offered him a position as his apprentice. Gawain needing money to start his adventure had accepted. It had been hard work, especially to gain respect from the best armor, sword, and blacksmith in Arendelle. But he had eventually done it and was allowed to work the forge without Old Man Jackson's constant watchful eye, which had taken two years of hard work and showing he could forge just as good as Jackson himself. Gawain, closed and locked the door, carefully taking his sword (which he had made himself), and carefully went "home". He was crossing the street toward the old building when he heard shouting. He stopped and frowned. _Who in their right mind is out at this time of night,_ Gawain thought to himself. He shook his head and started again, before he heard another voice, a girl's voice. Gawain grinned to himself, _a damsel in distress! I'll take it,_ and carefully drew his sword. As he continued, he saw another shadow; it was his friend, Kaleb. Actually Kaleb was more like a brother to a Gawain. Kay grinned at Gawain and pulled out his large makeshift polearm.

Gawain and Kaleb silently hid behind some barrels and looked around. Two large drunks had cornered a girl, who was holding a dagger of some sort. She was wearing a casual dress, though much better quality than anyone else in the city, and from the torch light from one of the men he could see she had dark strawberry blond hair, with a strange white streak in it. Her blue eyes were strangely fierce, like a cornered animal and she was angrily talking to the men.

"You had better walk away, or I'll make both of you regret it" she said her voice strangely calm but with a soft growl, "and I mean really regret it! Not like regretting eating a bad piece of fruit regret, but the bad kind of regret like 'I really shouldn't have messed with that kid the other day' and-"

The girl's voice trailed off as the men laughed and raised their fists. Gawain met Kay's eyes and gave a nod and together they charged. Gawain went for the one without the torch, swinging his sword low, hitting the guy in the knee. He howled in pain and swung his fist. Gawain ducked and swung again aiming for the guy's arm, and sliced his elbow open. The man stumbled back and Gawain repositioned his sword to strike. Suddenly the guy Kaleb was fighting backed up and nearly crashed into Gawain, forcing him to jump out of the way. Kaleb swung his Polearm and smashed it against the man's groin, causing a high pitch squeal to explode from the man's mouth. The man who Gawain had been fighting suddenly grabbed the dropped torch and swung it at Gawain, he tried to dodge but couldn't get out of the way until a flash of red came out of nowhere and stabbed the man in the arm with a dagger. The man howled and dropped the torch, and Kaleb quickly hit their heads with his Polearm, knocking them unconscious.

Gawain eyed the girl, "Nice shot," he commented, sheathing his sword. The girl grinned

"Thanks, not bad yourself," she said, "no really thank you both, I probably would have been in real trouble if you two hadn't come along and helped me, well actually you more like saved me and I helped you but-"

Gawain grinned and held up his hand, "no problem, though I have to ask, what were you thinking wandering the streets at a time like this? It's one in the morning!"

The girl shuffled her feet and mumbled something. Kaleb grunted and thrust the butt of his makeshift polearm in the ground, causing the girl to jump.

"My friend asked you a question, are you going to answer or not?" he towered over the girl menacingly.

"Calm down Kaleb," said Gawain shaking his head, then he turned to the girl, "sorry about him, he's like that to everyone. I'm Gawain, and this is Kaleb, and seriously, why are you out here?"

The girl looked at them and then smiled shyly "I'm Anna, and I'm exploring the town. I know it's bad to explore at night but it's the only time I can do it without my parents finding out 'cause I'm technically not supposed to leave home, and I've always wanted to see everything and I was really bored and I found a way out and…" the girl trailed off, and shuffled her feet when Kaleb and Gawain looked at each other.

"What," scoffed Kaleb, "are you under house arrest or something?"

Anna shuffled her feet "yeah" she said finally, "you could say that."

Gawain felt a small amount of pity for the girl, and he had to admit she was pretty cute for a damsel in distress. He thought about what to do, and then he turned to Kay and whispered so the girl couldn't hear them.

"I think she might make a good member," Gawain whispered to Kaleb, "She didn't back down against those guy's and it sounds like she has a reason to join up."

Kaleb frowned and then shrugged, "you're the Captain, so in the end it's your choice."

"I think we should take her to the base," Gawain told him carefully. Kaleb arched an eyebrow, but slowly nodded.

"Come with us," Gawain said, turning out of the alley, "It looks like you need a place to stay, and I think your story is a good one, so how about we take you to our safe house, and you tell us your story and we'll tell you ours."

Anna thought for a moment and then grinned, "Okay then, deal. Lead the way."

Anna was exited, to say the least. She had met two townspeople, who looked like they knew their way around, and had offered her a place to stay. She knew that she wouldn't have lessons for a few days, and her parents wouldn't really look for her due to meetings, and the servants would only look for her if something went missing, because she was supposed to be grounded.

The two boys who had found her were taking her through a series of side streets. The place they had spoke of, their safe house, sounded exiting, almost as if she were in one of the adventure stories she had read in the castle library. As they turned a corner, Anna took a closer look at her new friends. The one named Gawain, who looked about fifteen, was tall and muscular, and war a leather jerkin and pants, with thick boots, he had shoulder length black hair, and brown eyes. His skin was tanned slightly and he had several scars on his arms.

The other boy could hardly be called a boy at all. He was the biggest guy Anna had ever seen, even bigger than the palace guards. He was brawny and incredibly tall, nearly six foot if Anna had to guess, and carried his staff-thing (she thought it looked like a polearm) with ease, although it looked just as heavy as a jousting lance. He wore a cotton shirt and, pants that looked like they had been cut and sown back together to make room for his growth. He had black eyes, and incredibly short black hair. His skin though, was very strange, at least to Anna, for it was the color of chocolate. Anna had never before seen someone with that color skin before, at least in Arendelle.

Finally Gawain and Kaleb stopped at a rundown looking building. Gawain knocked on the door rhythmically (like a secret knock Anna thought with excitement), and the door opened to reveal a scrawny brown haired boy, who looked like he hadn't eaten in a few days.

"Hi Gawain, hi Kaleb" he said looking stoically, then he turned to Anna, "who's she?"

"Chatterbox, this is Anna. Anna this is Chatterbox" Said Gawain, grinning as the three of them entered the "safe house".

Anna grinned some more and sat down in a chair around a three legged table, along with the rest of the boys. Gawain let out a whistle and two other boys came out. Both boys had blond hair and looked as though they were twins. Gawain gestured to the table and the boys sat down next to each other.

"This is Pike and Smoke" Gawain told her, "Pike is the one on the left."

Kaleb shifted and looked at Anna, "you tell your story and we'll tell ours. Okay?"

Anna thought about it, _well, they did save me and offer me a place to stay. I guess I kind of owe them an explanation, but I won't tell them I'm a princess._

Anna cleared her throat and began. She told the boys how she was the daughter of a lord, and how Elsa shut her out and how Anna had been trying to get her to come out. She told them how the tutors told her she was terrible at everything and she needed to stop having her head in the clouds and to grow up. She also told them how Mama and Papa were always busy, and never told her why Elsa hated her, or shut her out, but how they were kind nonetheless, just very, very busy.

"So I just found a way out while trying to get a snack and ran into some mean men, who Gawain and Kaleb saved me from and here I am." Anna finished, and sighed.

The boys were quiet before one of them spoke up… Smoke was it? "We have it bad too, although in a different way. Captain, or Gawain as you know him, looks out for us. We're one big family here." Suddenly the other boy, Pike's face lit up.

"How about you join our crew!" He said excitedly, "We could use another member, once Gawain makes enough money for the ship and-"

"PIKE!" all of the boys shouted at once glaring at him, and Pike quickly shut up.

"What ship?" asked Anna excitedly, looking around at the boys.

There was silence, then Gawain slowly spoke up.

"Okay," he said, "you told your story so now we'll tell ours. I was born on a ship, and was a cabin boy all my life. I learned everything I could about ships, how to steer, about the different knots and mast types, and even sail material. I decided early on that I wanted to be a pi… privateer. On one of my voyages, I met Kaleb. He was on a slave ship I was on, on course for the Southern Isles when our when the ship docked here in Arendelle. I had had to go down into the brig often and he and I often spoke. When we arrived here to get supplies, I stole the keys to his cell and snuck him out, the night before we were scheduled to leave for the southern isles.

"We were on the streets for a while, until the smithy, Old Man Jackson offered me a job his shop. I've been trying to get enough money for a ship of my own for a while now. We met Chatterbox at the market. His name is a bit of a joke actually, he doesn't speak unless he has something really important to say. But he was on the streets to, and knew how to handle himself. Plus he doesn't get seasick. Then later on, we met up with Pike and Smoke, they were farmers but their father kicked them out because they didn't want to get married, which was really stupid considered they were eleven at the time, and that was about a year ago. We all agreed to become crewmates once we get our ship. It seems Pike here thinks you'd make a good one and we take that kind of thing seriously considering that crewmembers are like family, especially on a ship."

Anna thought hard about it, _I learned from Papa that 'privateer' is just a fancy way of saying pirate. But all the stories I've read has pirates having a lot of adventures and I've been trapped in the castle for a long time. It would be nice to be able to see the world, and have all the adventures I want, and they said crewmates are like family, and it would be nice not to be shut out anymore. But at the same time I can't leave Elsa, momma, and papa, and they would be disappointed if I left the castle to become a pirate. Plus I don't know these guys well enough. They did say that they didn't have enough money for a ship yet, so I should have plenty of time to get to know them, and it would be nice to have friends who weren't servants and thought I was just a spare. _

"I don't know how to fight, or anything about ships and being a crewmember, but I'm willing to learn." Anna said with a determined gaze. "I'll do it, but I need to be able to go back home, so I'll only be able to visit at night. So the servants or my parents know about me leaving home. But, being a _pirate_ sure sounds better than being a Lady."

Some of the boys shifted uncomfortably, but Gawain smiled, "Good, you know what you're getting into. You'll need to swear an oath first though."

Anna nodded, and repeated after Gawain; "_I pledge myself, to the captain, the crew and the ship that will be my home. I swear to protect those on board and to never betray the loyalty of the crew. I promise to treat the ship and its crew as my family and treat them with respect and share all loot gained equally. I swear to obey my Captain and serve the ship faithfully from now on and forevermore_."

Gawain smiled as, the rest of the boys cheered, and said "welcome to the family, Anna."

* * *

The next year passed both quickly and slowly for Anna. Gawain and the others taught her how to fight with swords, and her dagger properly. As the time passed she learned that although the gang had their quirks, they all were loyal and trustworthy. Several times she spoke to them about problems with her lessons (telling them it was part of her 'how to be a lady' training), and they even offered her advice on how to get past _the door_. Eventually, she and Gawain became close friends, and the others began to see her as a second-in-command of sorts. At first Kaleb was a little upset about this, but he eventually warmed up to her after she offered to teach him to read.

Gawain and the crew were in the safe house, one day, called there for an important meeting.

"If we're going to be pirates we need to do this properly, and that means we need a flag. I know a lot of pirates have weird symbols like skulls and swords, but I'm hoping that our flag is going to be a little more… unique. I want all of us to think of what we hate or fear most and we'll put it on the flag. I'll go first; I hate being chained down in one place and not be able to do what I want with my life."

Anna took a deep breath and said, "I hate the fact that everyone in my family is shutting me out. So I guess… doors?"

They continued around, until Pike, who was the best artist, came up with some designs. The first few were terrible and everyone hated them. But the fifth design all of them agreed on. The flag was Black (of course) with a white door, with a red snowflake on it (Pike was afraid of freezing to death), and with a skeleton chained in front of it (both Gawain and Kaleb contributed to this design, as Kaleb didn't want to be a slave again). The skeleton was kneeling in front of the door, it's back arched and its hands up, scratching at the door as if trying to get in or out (Smoke was afraid of being abandoned again). The design was given to Anna, who had sewing among her other lessons back at the palace.

* * *

More time passed, and Anna eventually began trying to sneak out during the daytime to see the crew. Gawain made money at the smithy, and even made Anna her own sword, as well as proper weapons for the others. Eventually they were met with another crewmember dubbed Smarts, Smarts had been a bastard son of a smaller noble in the kingdom of Corona, and knew virtually everything there was to know about maps, navigation, and flags. Smarts had fairly wiry figure with dirty blond hair and blue eyes, and when he concentrated on things really hard, he didn't notice anything going on around him (Pike, Smoke and Anna often played pranks on him when he did this). When they were bored, one day, they chose ranks for themselves, and Anna drafted out a pirates code for the ship. One day while bored they had played a game of guess the truth, where one had to guess the truth out of the three total statements was. It was during one of these games while alone with Gawain, that she told him the truth about her being the princess. He had asked if she could gain the money to buy their ship, but she had declined saying it would be too hard to do it without her parents finding out.

On one of these boring days, Anna and the others were talking about Elsa, and ideas for how to either get her out of her room, or get past _the door_. They had been discussing this for quite some time when suddenly Chatterbox spoke up.

"Every time you, knock on the door, she tells you to 'go away' right? Does she use those exact words? Do your parents say this as well? How long have they been doing this?"

Anna frowned, "yeah, Elsa uses those exact words, momma and papa don't though, they just say their busy, and they've been doing this since oh… since I was five so… five years. Why do you ask?"

Chatterbox frowned, "I may have this wrong, but have you ever thought that by 'go away' she meant, 'get out' as in run away? Don't misunderstand me, but it sounds like they really don't want you around at all. I know you love your family, but even Smart's parents were able to make time for him, and your sister and your parents sound like they don't want to. No offence."

Anna stared at Chatterbox horrified, it had crossed her mind that she might be unwanted in the palace, but she had usually had pushed the thought away almost immediately after she thought such things. _Yeah, my parents are always busy, and yes Elsa's always telling me go away faster than she used to but… could it really mean I'm unwanted_. Normally she would think someone who said something like that was crazy_, but Chatterbox has always been very smart for his age, and even though he doesn't say much, what he does say is right, or the best opinion, depending on the situation._ Chatterbox looked at her sympathetically.

"If you need to know for certain you can always test your parents, you said they always avoid talking about why your sister shut herself away. However, don't drop the subject, press on and fight back, _make them_ tell you. You don't have to do it today or even tomorrow, but if ever feel like you need to find out… you have a right to know Anna, you are a member of their family, and _real_ families don't keep each other in the dark, especially about something as important as this."

Anna thought for a moment and then nodded. _Chatterbox is right_, she decided. _If they really love me, they'll tell me, because family helps each other out_. For some reason, however, Anna couldn't shake a feeling of foreboding, at what was about to come.

* * *

Anna had returned to the castle very early a few days after her eleventh birthday, and had been once again pondering what Chatterbox had said about her family. Elsa had now refused to even acknowledge her whenever she knocked at the door, and simply waited for Anna to give up. Anna was not one to give up easily, but even she was beginning to feel defeat as each one of her knocks went unanswered. Anna had, for a while talked to Elsa about her days and her lessons, though she left out her escapades into the town. A few times she could have sworn she heard giggles, and one time she was certain she had heard Elsa suppress a snort of laughter. But vocal signs of her sister listening became less and less as time went on until she was faced with the crushing silence as usual.

Anna was suddenly pulled out of her thoughts by a knock on her bedroom door.

"Princess Anna," it was Kai. "Your parents would like to speak to you in the library."

Anna blinked. _This is a first,_ she thought, as she followed Kai out of her room and into the library. _Momma and papa never ask to talk to me. _Suddenly a thought struck her like lightning, _what if they're finally going to tell me why Elsa won't talk to me! I must have shown them that I'm responsible enough to know, since I'm great at taking care of Pharis. Even the stable boy says I am really responsible when it comes to taking care of my horse._ A small smile graced her lips as she approached her parents. However it quickly vanished when she saw the looks on their faces. Both her mother and father looked sternly at her, almost as if she was in trouble, which she couldn't be because she hadn't done anything wrong… _unless they found out I know about the passage! _Anna was now a little worried.

"So," she started, trying to sound lighthearted, "you guy's wanted to see me?"

Her parents exchanged looks. "We have spoken to your tutors, and are very disappointed in you Anna." Her father began, "as princess of Arendelle, you have a duty to this kingdom, and that means you have to take your studies seriously. You have done nothing but fail several of your tests, and have skipped several of your lessons."

Anna couldn't believe her ears, "but you two have been pushing me take lessons all the time, I don't have any free time anymore and the time I do have I'm stuck doing homework or hanging out with…Joan."

"Joan?" her mother asked raising an eyebrow.

"Yeah," said Anna, trying to cover up that she nearly had revealed her escapes, "the portrait of Joan of Arc in the portrait room. Considering you two are always busy and Elsa won't talk to me, there isn't really anyone else to hang out with-"

"You talk to paintings?" her father said incredulously, "Anna, you are to stop immediately, such behavior is not fitting for a princess. And you are to now spend your free time under supervision to make sure you are behaving accordingly when not in your room."

Anna was horrified. If she was under constant watch she wouldn't be able to visit Arendelle anymore. She would be truly trapped in the palace, and without the freedom that she had slowly become accustom to she was certain she would go crazy.

"No!" She cried before she could stop herself, "I am a part of this family, I deserve to have time to myself without being treated like a prisoner, and this is my home! I don't know what I or Elsa did to be stuck in her room, but _I cannot_ live like that!"

King Adgar's frown deepened, "your sister is not under house arrest! Elsa is dealing with problems that she must solve on her own-"

Queen Idun suddenly hissed at him, but Anna hardly noticed, her temper was now flaring more than it had in a long time. Suddenly years of being shut out suddenly became too much, and with a new threat of being shut in as well as out, Anna snapped.

"What is wrong with Elsa? There is nothing wrong with my sister! If she is having a problem than as we should be helping her, _I_ should be helping her! And if she isn't under house arrest than why is she always in her room? Why won't she come out, why won't she at least talk to me even through the door? Why won't-"

"That is none of your concern!" Her father began sharply, but Anna cut him off.

"NONE OF MY CONCERN?! I'm her _sister;_ of course it's my concern! If Elsa needs help we should _all_ be willing to give it, we're _all_ part of her family, and family shouldn't keep secrets from each other!" Anna was shouting now, her mother, who had been sitting down was now on her feet. Both of her parents looked murderous, but Anna didn't care.

"I have tried so hard to be what you want, but never have you given me what I want; I want Elsa! I want to see my sister, I want her to be able to leave her room, and not be alone, because _no one_ wants to be alone! I don't care how bad this 'problem' is, I want to help, I _need_ to help! And do try to focus on my lessons, but I can't because aside from being boring, I am constantly worried about _my_ _sister_! I am a part of this family right? Then tell me what is happening, tell me how I can help her, tell me the _truth_! Don't shut me out anymore!"

"NO!" her parents shouted together, and the queen stared at Anna, she almost looked scared, but she mostly looked furious.

"Do not talk back to your father," She began angrily, "you are the princess of Arendelle and a princess never raises her voice, especially to her father! And as for your sister, you _cannot_ know, what is happening with Elsa! That is _none_ of your concern even if you are her sister! If you truly are a part of this family you would not address us so!"

King Adgar's voice was now steel "If you truly want to be a part of this family you have to show us that you do! Start by focusing on your lessons, and not concerning yourself with matters out of your control, such as Elsa!"

"What?!" Anna cried, "Elsa is my _sister_ and that _makes it_ my concern! And I do focus on my lessons, at least I try to, but even after I ask the tutors I don't get it! Don't you see? I'm trying, but I need more time! I will get it, I will be good enough, I am more than just the spare! Let me prove it, let me help with Elsa! Give me a chance! I can-"

"No! We have already made up our minds on the matter! You _will not_ approach Elsa! And if you truly are not doing well at your best, as you seem to think, than perhaps your best is not good enough! You have to try harder, and stop complaining about your sister, end of discussion!"

Anna stared at her father, matching his gaze and didn't flinch, she remembered what her friend had told her and now she knew; she needed to know, was she wanted? She took a deep breath and spoke.

"No." Her voice was almost a deadly quiet, "NOT end of discussion. I will help my sister, as her sister it is my job and-"

"Get out."

Anna's words died in her throat. Her mind suddenly blank, she barely was able to keep enough train of thought to start "But-"

"ANNA!" Her father roared, "_GET OUT_!"

Anna's mind reeled; she barely registered charging out the door of the library. _No, it can't be, but he just said… he's throwing me out! I really am just the spare to them; he didn't even deny it when I brought it up! I can't be unwanted, I just can't! _There was only one thing left to do, one way to be certain if this terrible truth was real. She shot up the stairs and banged on _the door_.

"Elsa, please!" Anna practically sobbed, "Help me! Don't let mama and papa do this to me! I'm your sister! Please Elsa; just this once let me in!"

Anna reached for the doorknob and began turned it, and began to push the door open, before her sister's shrill yell penetrated her mind:

"Get out Anna! GET OUT!"

She heard footsteps, she saw guards, and without another thought, Anna ran. Down the hall, up the next flight of stairs and through a false wall, that she had discovered a few years ago. Anna's mind was still reeling, but slowly the truth of her situation. She was unwanted, the guards chasing her were there to throw her out of the palace, because she wasn't good enough, because she was just the spare, and the spare was no longer needed… or wanted, by anyone. Anna felt tears begin to escape her eyes, but she quickly tried to hold them in. She now knew what she had to do.

When the footsteps faded she followed the passage to one of the storage rooms. Quickly, she grabbed a nearby bag and began rifling through the shelves and drawers looking for anything of value. Gold, gems, old heirlooms, were quickly put in the bag, before she snuck, out of the room and after several close calls, made it to the secret tunnel that led to the treasury room and began to fill the rest of the bag with gold. When it was filled, she snuck back to her room, and grabbed her bag, sword, and the Flag that she had secretly made for their ship, before sneaking to the portrait/tunnel, and running to the safe house.

When she finally arrived was when she lost the battle to control her tears. As Gawain, Kaleb, Smoke, Pike, and Smarts held and comforted her she eventually got enough control to say that she had been as good as banished. She handed the bag filled with treasure to Gawain, and looked at him.

"I hope that is enough for a ship" said Anna through sobs, "because I want to leave and never come back here."

Gawain looked in the bag and nearly dropped it. He nodded numbly, and left, barely choking out that he was going to a place to sell the treasure without having too many questions asked, before practically sprinting out the door. The boys looked at one another, and silently they began to pack their things, while one of them stayed to comfort Anna. It was early morning the next day when Gawain came back, and the crew left together for the Harbor, with Anna wearing a cloak and hood to conceal her face. Though it took much haggling, yelling, and even some threatening, the crew walked down the harbor at their new ship. It was well worn, with too many barnacles on the hull. The two masts were well worn and the sails had definitely seen better days. But at that moment none of them cared. Gawain and his crew got on the ship and he handed a bag of new maps to Smarts telling him where they needed to go, and they immediately set off on their new adventure.

* * *

Elsa was sitting on her bed, silently cursing herself, and worried out of her mind. Never had Anna sounded so… desperate, so _terrified_. Elsa had know the moment her sister had started talking that something was terribly wrong, she knew she had heard yelling down stairs, though it was far enough away that Elsa hadn't know what anyone was saying but from the sound of it, _whatever_ it was had been incredibly serious. She had recognized her parents and Anna's voices, but it didn't make since because Anna never argued, much less shouted at anyone. Needless to say, Elsa was worried, as if it wasn't made obvious by the ice which had since made its way halfway up the walls of her room.

When Anna had first banged on her door, Elsa had been reading at her desk. When her sister had slammed her fist on her door, she had been so surprised that she accidently froze most of her floor. Then Anna had started talking… no _begging_ Elsa to let her in, with a desperation she had never heard from her sister before. It had sounded as if her life had depended on it. Elsa had been frozen there trying desperately to think of something to say, until Anna tried to open the door. Elsa had panicked, with half her room frozen; she had lashed out without thinking, yelling those unforgivable words. Then she had heard her sister run away, but… it had also sounded like she had been followed by several others. For a moment Elsa wondered if the castle was under attack, and slowly peeked out the door. No, they were palace guards, not enemy soldiers, and by the sound of it, they were after… Anna?

Elsa's mind continued to spin in circles, trying desperately to make sense of what had happened, what her sister and parents had been yelling about, why Anna had sounded so terrified when she banged on her door, and most puzzling (at least to Elsa) was why had her sister tried to _open_ her door? All through the years, Anna had never once tried to open it, by the doorknob at least. Usually Anna had simply done either crazy stunts, or simply talked to Elsa _through_ the door, but she had never once tried to actually _open_ it. That was what had Elsa worried now. Because Elsa knew that Anna _never_ would have done that unless something was _very_ wrong.

Elsa did not get any answers to her questions. Even when she had asked Kai and Gerda, when she came out to breakfast. Or that one guard she had seen when her sister had made her mad dash from Elsa's room. No one told her anything, for two days, then three, until it was the end of the week, and Elsa was equal parts annoyed and worried especially since Anna hadn't once knocked on her door. Her parent's hadn't come to her room either, which wasn't unusual, but when she had caught a glimpse of them on her way to the library one evening, both of her parents had looked almost frantic; arguing with each other in hushed whispers, and had stopped when they had spotted Elsa.

After the second week passed, Elsa was fully prepared to confront both her parents, about whatever had happened. Everyone was refusing to tell her anything, and Elsa was actually beginning to consider knocking on _Anna's_ door, when she was pulled out of her thoughts by a knock at her own.

Elsa took a deep breath, and opened the door, revealing her parents standing in the hallway. Her father opened his mouth to speak, but Elsa beat him to it.

"Where's Anna? Why was half the palace guard running after her, and why won't anyone tell me anything?" she demanded trying desperately to make her voice sound as though there was no room for excuses.

Her father sighed, and slowly began to speak, "Anna is not in the palace anymore. Please let me finish." He added hastily when Elsa opened her mouth to continue.

"Anna has been sent out of the palace to a boarding school in another kingdom. She has been having trouble with her lessons and we thought it best to send her somewhere where she could learn where she wouldn't have… distractions. She wasn't very happy about it at first, from one of the guards, she tried to asking you to get her out of it, but when we finally found her, she agreed to leave. She left several hours ago for Corona, I'm afraid. She says that she sends her love though. She would have come herself but her ship left very early, and she didn't want to wake you."

Elsa kept her face neutral, although she felt uncertain. _Didn't want to wake me?_ Elsa wondered to herself. _That certainly hasn't stopped her before. And why wouldn't she tell me sooner? Or is she finally mad at me enough that she's stopped trying to talk to me?_

Her mother stepped forward, "I know you must feel sad that Anna didn't tell you herself, but, she was upset with all of us when she left. Your isolation, though… necessary has taken its toll on her."

Elsa thought about this for a moment, and finally nodded, "Very well, I hope she enjoys herself in Corona, I hear it's nice this time of year."

Her parents nodded and bid Elsa farewell. But even as the door closed, Elsa felt a nagging sensation in the back of her mind, telling her that she should not have dropped the subject.

The king and queen slowly made their way back to their room. Both of them were exhausted from the strain the past two weeks. When the door had shut Idun slowly turned to her husband a troubled expression on her face.

"Are you sure that not telling Elsa is a good idea? Anna is her sister; she deserves to know that she is missing, doesn't she?"

King Adgar sighed, "Elsa has enough to worry about right now, especially with her powers, getting more and more out of control. Something like this would only send her over the edge. Until Anna is found, Elsa cannot know that her sister is missing. If anyone asks she is at finishing school, or accompanying us on diplomatic missions when we are away. There can be no room for error. For Elsa's sake, we cannot have her know about this, or she will lose whatever control she has gained."

The queen sighed and nodded, and the king turned to Kai, who had been standing in the corner, and gave a nod. The butler sighed and gave a nod in return. No one could know about the missing princess. Especially not her sister.


	2. Chapter 1: The Unintended Contract

**BatteriezNotIncluded here, sorry for the delay but aside from trying to figure out the workings of the website, and actually writing said chapter it took a bit longer than I anticipated. I probably will take a long time to upload chapters; I don't upload on a schedule, only when I get inspired so expect quality over quantity. **

**Of course as usual; I do not own Frozen, Pirates of the Caribbean, etc. Please feel free to follow, review, and leave constructive criticism, and please remember; this is my first fanfic so please no flames. Thanks!**

* * *

Chapter 1

_Seven Years Later_

The ship cut through the water at a seemingly breakneck pace. Stark white sails on each of its three masts were unfurled, the dark wood of the ship, almost black in the light, was trimmed with red and gold. Upon the prow of the ship where on other ships would be a carved woman, this ship instead held a bird; a phoenix. The ship's name both carved and painted in gold was _The Mourning Angel_.

The skies were impossibly clear, the water still choppy from the storm the night before. The men onboard _The Mourning Angel _were hard at work, adjusting the rigging, and searching the horizon for their prey. The captain stood at the wheel, steering the ship, making the occasional adjustment to his course. Though it was a beautiful day for sailing, with the wind strong and at their backs, the captain had a scowl across his face.

"They should have washed up here," he muttered to himself, then yelled louder, "Hawkeye! Any sign of them?"

The man in the crow's nest peeked out, "No Captain! No sign of them yet!"

The captain frowned; their target should have shown itself by now. Though it was a vessel of importance, the storm had separated it from its convoy, leaving it alone and helpless. Captain and crew continued to anxiously watch the horizon, scanning for any signs of the lost ship.

Normally, the captain would not be looking for the ship, and simply be searching for merchant vessels to raid and such. However, the kingdoms had seen fit to raise security around several of their vessels, and had gotten good at hiding their routes, resulting in a very slow year for all of them. It was not a good thing, especially for possibly the most feared pirate on the seas. For the first time in… well, forever, he had needed to take a contract.

Contracts on the whole weren't bad per say, it was just most of them involved revenge, slave trade, and rarely had any nice treasure to loot. Contracts though had fair prices (most of the time) just didn't have the exhilaration of simply pirating. There was also a secondary problem with contracts however; though the information on the target was given, not _all_ of the information was shared, and in this business, it could result in getting caught or worse. The Captain slowly thought back to the briefing of this particular contract. He had known it wasn't going to be easy, but he wished he knew a little bit more.

* * *

"Bless me Barnacles," said the Contract keeper of Tortuga, "if it isn't the Dreaded Pirate Roberts! What brings you here to the land of us simple folk?"

The captain sighed, "a contract, what else, Crabber?"

The contract keeper, Crabber, gave a toothless smile, and let out a wheezing chuckle.

"Bad year for you too, eh mate? Royals may be fools, but the second their coffers are threatened they become smart. Shame eh?" Crabber sighed, "I have a contract; a simple grab and go. A lady of the kingdom of Arendelle is heading for the kingdom of Corona; someone wants to make sure she never gets there."

Roberts grunted, "We're pirates, not assassins, Crabber. Since when did you start accepting those contracts?"

Crabber glared, "You don't kill her, the client has something else in mind. He wants her to be brought to Riggins Port, a few miles from Weselton."

A voice on Roberts right spoke up, "who's the target?"

Crabber eyed the speaker, "First Mate Kay, is it? I'll tell you if you accept, got it?"

Kay frowned and eyed Roberts. Roberts knew this look; Kay was suspicious, not that Roberts could blame him. This whole thing was suspicious, though to be fair, most pirate contracts were.

"How much?" Asked Roberts, raising an eyebrow.

Crabber's grin widened, "this much."

Roberts nearly dropped the paper, and heard Kay give a gasp. The amount was ludicrous! It would be enough to sustain his crew for months and still have money left over. Roberts slowly took Kay to the side.

"I'm not going to lie; we need this, but all this for one woman? Sounds too much like a Royal." Roberts muttered to his quartermaster. Roberts had one rule on his ship; plunder and pillage all the merchants you like, but never touch a Royal. This rule so far had kept them alive; Royalty was much more likely to ignore you if you ignored them, they saw you as a nuisance with pillaging the merchant vessels, but otherwise didn't take direct action, like sending the royal navy to bring your head on a pike.

Kay gave a nod, "It does look pretty suspicious, and I can't think of anyone in Arendelle who is worth _that_ much except… you're right though, we need the money. I say we do it. We can ask Andrews when we get back to the ship."

Roberts nodded, "You've earned yourself a pirate, so who is this poor unfortunate dame?"

"As I told you before, she's from Arendelle. She's the Lady Genova of house Tollak. She's on a diplomatic mission trying to secure some sort of special trade item, not even our inside man could crack what it is. Anyway, your job is to make sure she doesn't get there. Here's the ship's name and the colors it will be flying. Good luck mate, you'll need it."

Roberts took the paper from Crabbers and returned to his ship beside Kay. The moment his feet touched the deck of _The Mourning Angel_ he gave a shout.

"Quartermaster Andrews! Front and center in my cabin, now!"

Roberts and Kay went directly to the captain's quarters and began to take out several maps, and manifests. A moment later, there was a knock, and the quartermaster entered.

"So, did you find anything interesting?" Andrews said with a slight smile.

"We don't know yet," Kay replied, "we were hoping you could give us some info on our target, a lady from Arendelle. It's a kidnapping job, though, so did if Wiz has anymore of those smoke bombs, we'll need 'em."

Andrews pouted, "Arendelle? Really? I really was hoping to avoid them."

"We know, Andrews, but it was the only job big enough for the whole crew. Speaking of which," Roberts said, he handed the contract to Andrews, "what do you think?"

Andrews read the contract over, "well it's well written… no secret clauses we need to worry about… and the pay is—wait, WHAT?"

Andrew nearly dropped the parchment, and Roberts could see the quartermaster rereading the payment again. Andrew's mouth was hanging open slightly, and after a moment mouth dry said, "Is this a joke?"

Kay shook his head, "Nope, no joke. The target is a Arendelle high lady by the sound of it. Name of Genova of house Tollak, know anythi-"

Andrew suddenly cut him off, "Did you say house Tollak? That can't be right; they were stripped of their titles after a pretty severe scandal. Not many people know about it though, the other nobles and p…" a pause, "the king made it a secret, so no one outside the council would know about it, it was _that_ bad. It doesn't make since that there would be someone from that old noble family would be re granted their titles."

Both Roberts and Kay exchanged worried glances, "There is definitely something going on, that's for sure…" the first mate began, "but we already agreed to do the job, so let's get ready to sail."

* * *

Roberts was suddenly pulled out of his thoughts by a sudden shout.

"Ship! Two miles of the starboard side!" Hawkeye's cry from the crow's nest. "It bears the colors of the ship we're after! Looks she's the… _HMS Adgar_."

Roberts's eyes glinted as he pulled down his black leather mask. Adjusting course he began to sail for the ship. He carefully pulled out his spy glass and looked toward the horizon. Sure enough there floated a lone ship, its sails worse for wear, and its flag though faded, bore the colors of Corona and Arendelle. In these particular waters, such flags would be a symbol to show that they did not mean any harm. But now they only served to wave a target from the highest mast.

"Prepare the cannons! Ready weapons and get a hold of those smoke bombs! Remember lads; we want scared to dead… if possible."

There was a loud laugh from the crew as the ran to their stations. The ship was coming up fast. Hawkeye, had clambered out of the crow's nest was now next to the captain, his spyglass out as well.

"Looks like we'll be in firing range in about… ten minutes sir." He said, practically bouncing with excitement.

Roberts grinned back at him, "Get your musket ready, lad. That boarding party looks like they'll need all the help they can get."

Indeed it did look like they would need it. Even though the other ship's crew was doing anything hostile (yet), Roberts could see several armed men on board. More so than a normal diplomatic ship. Roberts' frown deepened. It was normal, especially with the amount of other pirates for there to be armed men on board a ship, especially merchant ships, but diplomatic ships? It was a sign of aggression, even with the amount of piracy nowadays, so usually those kinds of ships had just the crew armed, certainly not armed guards on top of that. _Something isn't right._ Roberts thought grimly. He knew his crew could take them, but the extra muscle was a surprise… and pirates _did not_ like surprises, specifically armed kinds.

Andrews ran up to Roberts; one hand on his sword and a pistol in his other hand. "That's a lot of guards. Are you sure this is the right boat? I mean it's normal for there to be guards, but that's a lot of muscle, especially for a diplomatic mission…"

Andrews stopped talking when Roberts raised his hand. "I know, I saw." He told the quartermaster grimly. "We'll just have to deal with it. Probably use more of those smoke bombs than we planned."

"Captain!" Shouted Kay, "They've spotted us. Looks like their trying to send a distress signal."

Several members of the crew jeered at this and even Roberts had to crack a smile, _idiots,_ he grinned to himself. Then turned to Kay and shouted, "Get Smarts out here and have him relay a message back to them. Tell him to ask who they are and what their status of their ship is."

"Captain, we're in firing range!" shouted the ship's Gunner.

"Load the Cannons but don't reveal them yet!" Roberts shouted back.

"Captain Roberts!" shouted Smarts, "they say that their ship was separated from the convoy, they also say that they're running out of supplies, their rudders' broke and they've been adrift for three days."

"Good! That means their desperate!" Roberts laughed, "very trusting of them to tell us all this."

"Aye sir" Smarts giggled, "but I told them we were here on a delivery shipment. They want to see our colors."

"True enough" Roberts replied, "But they want to see our color's eh? Here that lads! They want to see the colors!"

Cheers erupted from the crew and many of them shook their cutlasses and pistols. Roberts gave a nod to the quartermaster and Andrews' raised voice rang out; "Aim the Cannons, and hoist the Colors! Let's show them why people fear the Dreaded Pirate Roberts!"

The flaps on the side of the ship flipped upward revealing the cannons being pushed through the holes. The crew rushed to light the powder, and held the cannons steady. The cannons fired with a loud boom, and the mast on the poor diplomatic ship splintered. The crew cheered as the cannons were reloaded and fired again and again; the other ship trying desperately to defend themselves. They had been caught on unawares however, and only thing that happened was the soldiers on the enemy ship were scattered by the cannon fire.

"Ready the smoke bombs, and prepare to board!" Andrews yelled over the cannons, and the crew jumped at the orders.

The crew of _The Mourning Angel_ lit the smoke bombs and threw them at the already damaged ship. The few soldiers that had managed to grab their weapons were now on the ground coughing as the gas released from the smoke bombs. The crew then grabbed several ropes and grappling hooks and threw them at _The Adgar_. Andrew and the pirates ran forward and leaped off the ship, and onto _The Adgar_, weapon's drawn.

Roberts saw Andrews' feet slam into one of the soldiers, before bringing the sword down in a flash, smacking the pommel into the man's head. The guard stumbled back dazed, but Andrews was already moving. A boot to the groin, a pistol shot to the knee, the sword finding an enemy's thigh. Andrews moved as if in a deadly dance, spinning and twirling, and taking down enemy soldiers as quickly as they would appear.

Kay was not as graceful, but he was definitely just as deadly. He swung his two double bladed axes wildly, with his strength and reach, the blades always found flesh. Screams and howls could be heard as several of the soldiers suddenly went from choking on smoke, to screaming in pain because their arm or leg was suddenly missing. One poor soldier tried to get behind Kay, swinging his sword at Kay's head, but Kay twisted and caught the sword in his teeth, before smashing his massive knee in the man's groin. The man screamed, as Kay spat out the sword, raised his ax, and let it fall, and the man screamed no more.

The rest of the pirate boarding party was just as effective; what they lacked in finesse, they made up for in numbers. Several of the pirates had cornered several guardsmen and were making short work of them. Sometimes an enemy soldier would suddenly scream mid charge and Roberts would know that Hawkeye's musket had found its mark. The deck of the _HMS Adgar_ was quickly becoming slick with blood, and the air seemed to grow cold as death continued his feast.

The captain of the falling ship ran out of his cabin, sword drawn, and Andrews rushed to meet him. The captain swung his sword and the quartermaster expertly dove underneath it, swinging sword with the momentum, slicing the captain's side. Andrews rolled behind the poor man and twirled around, sword arcing as it met the man's throat. Andrews pulled the man's head back and Roberts saw the man's face pale as his quartermaster whispered something in captain of _The Adgar_'s ear. The man's face went stark white, and his mouth seemed to gape like a fish.

"Stand down!" the poor man cried his voice higher than it should have been, "Countrymen, STAND DOWN!"

Slowly the guardsmen and crew of the _HMS Adgar_ stopped fighting, and lowered their weapons. Roberts saw Andrews give orders to the boarding party, and saw his crewmates scramble below deck, gathering the fallen weapons, and forcing the conquered boatmen to kneel in surrender. Roberts gave a nod to his quartermaster and first mate, and Kay quickly took the captain by the scruff of the neck, while Andrews swung back onto _The Mourning Angel _and disappeared below deck_._ Several minutes later, several men, both crew, guardsmen, and what looked like finely clothed servants came from the hold, hands on their heads in surrender. After a few moments, Roberts saw his Hawkeye walk down and yell something in the stairwell. Slowly the rest of his crew came up, with a single woman in tow, with swords pressed against her back.

She was obviously a lady of sorts, Roberts could tell by the way she carried herself; even with the swords pressed to her back, her back was straight, her chin held high, and her very body language seemed to scream regality. She wore a teal dress, with long turquoise gloves that reached halfway to her elbows. She was incredibly pale, with her platinum blond hair in a strange version of a bun, and from his spyglass, Roberts could see her crystalline blue eyes glaring down at his crew.

Roberts grabbed one of the spare grappling hooks and swung down on the _HMS Adgar_, and quickly addressed its crew.

"My, my, my," Roberts smiled eyeing the fallen crew, "what do we have here? Bilge rats, and strong arms. Is there some kind of royal tournament that I don't know about? Or perhaps not, considering your lackluster performance against my… humble crew. " More sneering.

"So," Roberts continued, pointedly ignoring the Lady. Let her think that he didn't think her important enough to address. They always hated that. "Perhaps a traveling circus? No, there's no menagerie, though plenty of clowns." This time he allowed himself a sideways glance at the lady. Some of the captured servants gasped. Roberts smile widened, and he allowed it to twist into a fairly malicious grin. He turned to the captain, and raised his voice.

"So you're the one in charge of this rabble. I can't say I'm surprised with the way you're sniveling over there." He walked toward the cowering man, terrifying smile ever present.

"Do you know what pirates do to people like you?" Although his voice was soft, he knew from the gasps from the crew that they had heard him. The captains eyes widened even wider and he began to tremble.

Roberts arched his eyebrow, "you mean you don't know what people like me do to people like you? Oh, shame. I had rather hoped my reputation as a pirate preceded me. Ah well, I suppose I can simply send a message to let you non believers know. Now, what kind of message should I send?" He asked rhetorically, though he knew his crew would immediately start shouting various torture methods. This was simply a game to them; like a child playing with their food before eating it.

"Oh, I've got it!" Roberts exclaimed after a couple minutes of letting the captain sweat bullets; "I'll give you a choice: my men cut off your tongues and feed it to the man next to you. We take your valuables and food from the hold and your quarters, and we leave you to drift after the storm and let you pray that Davey Jones has mercy on your souls. Or," Roberts paused for dramatic effect, "You could give me the women. We'll leave the food, and only take some of the valuables."

The captain looked at him incredulously, and Roberts chuckled, "I know, seems like a bad deal, but after a storm like that, my men are tired, and they could use some… fun."

The maids whimpered at this, and Roberts saw the Lady's eyes flash. _Yep, there it is, _now _she's afraid, about time._ He didn't like using these kind of scare tactics, but men had tendencies to make bad decisions when afraid. He could already see the gears turning in the captain's head; if Roberts had thought he was nervous before, than this captain was sweating buckets now. The captain's eyes drifted to the Lady, and he seemed to sigh. Roberts smiled slightly; the man was going to make a decision he knew he would regret.

The captain opened his mouth to speak, but a cool female voice beat him to it; "let my men go."

Roberts turned and stared at The Lady. _Huh?_ He wondered, _but she's high born, rich blokes like her _never_ care about the people under them! And here I thought I was going to have to be a little more persuasive. She has to be playing some kind of angle, time to call her bluff._

"And why, pray tell would I do something like that?" asked Roberts smiling smugly.

"Because if you don't," the Lady began, "the entire Arendelle Navy will be after your hide. Let us go, and I promise your punishments will be lenient."

Roberts blinked, and did the only thing he could think of that would throw her off; he laughed. His crew quickly joined in exchanging howls and sniggers with one another. This lasted for a minute before Roberts turned back to the lady and arranged his face to look sympathetic, but allowed his smirk to remain.

"Awww," he cooed teasingly, "you poor thing, you. You must think we're armatures, who simply got lucky, am I right? Well then, I guess it wasn't you who asked to see my _particular_ jolly roger then."

The lady didn't respond, though her eyebrows nit together in confusion. Her glove hands, which had been fisted at her sides, seemed to unconsciously come up and cover her chest. Roberts smiled coyly now and turned back toward _The Mourning Angel._

"Mr. Hawkeye! Lower the colors to half mast, so Her Ladyship can have a better look-see, eh?"

Hawkeye gave a salute and began to lower the flag. Slowly the black flag rippled in the wind, and became clear to all those on _The Adgar._ Roberts heard gasps of shock, and footsteps as prisoners took an involuntary step away from him. The Lady's eyes went from confused to forced cool indifference, but not before Roberts could see another emotion enter her eyes; panic. She turned to him her eyes narrowing, but her arms still crossed.

"Captain Roberts" she said simply, in understanding.

"That's the _Dreaded Pirate Roberts_ to you, now that you know my name, it would be polite to inform me of yours," Roberts continued smirk widening.

The woman met his gaze evenly, "I am Lady Genova of House Tollak of Arendelle."

Roberts smiled _at least she's honest_ he thought to himself then spoke, addressing the rest of the ship: "As you can see, I already have the Arendelle Navy after me, and the Corona Royal Navy, and the Southern Isles, and even that tiny little Duchy, Westelton has its pathetic excuse for a navy after me as well. And yet here I am, with my crew, holding your hapless guards at bay, giving your captain a choice of how he wants me to treat himself and crew. And that brings me back to my question," Captain Roberts dropped his smile and put on his best serious face, and turned back to the trembling captain.

"So," Captain Roberts said coldly, "what do you want, your women, or you and your crew's lives!"

The captain trembled, looking from The Lady, to his crew and the guardsmen, his sweat coming off his skin by the bucketful. He trembled from head to toe, and stared at The Lady, looking almost pleading. Suddenly The Lady stepped forward.

"I have a new deal to propose to you, Captain Roberts," She said her voice betraying no emotion.

Roberts turned to her and quirked an eyebrow, "do tell, Your Ladyship." He gestured for her to continue.

"Leave the food, and crew's valuables, all of the crew and guards will be allowed to stay on the ship and leave in peace, as well as my attendants. In exchange, take myself and my valuables and allow everyone else to leave in peace."

The captain's eyes widened and he cried out, "No, you can't do this Your H-" The captain suddenly stopped talking as The Lady glared at him, and the temperature seemed to drop, in fact Roberts could swear his breath had started to crystallize in front of him, but it stopped as soon as the captain stopped talking, and swallowed visibly.

Roberts smiled and turned to The Lady, and pretended to think, "I find your terms… acceptable. Search her quarters and lock her in the brig!"

He waited until The Lady disappeared down _The Mourning Angel_'s hold before turning back to his crew.

"Remove their weapons, and powder, take the prisoners and lock them below deck, except for the captain here; tie him upside down to the mast, and set this hunk of wood to full sail and set it on course for Arendelle!" He ordered. Without another word, Roberts grabbed a rope and swung back aboard _The Mourning Angel_.

* * *

Roberts was reading the contract over again and was halfway through it when he felt _The Mourning Angel_ set sail, away from _The HMS Adgar_. He heard a knock at his door and it opened to reveal Kay.

"Not a bad haul on board sir. Had lots of jewels, should be easy to sell. One of the maids, Gerda I think her name was, refused to part with Lady Genova, so we stuck her in the brig as well. Very feisty that one. Would have asked you first, but I think she even scared Scar."

Roberts nodded, "ah well, no harm done. Now all we have to do is sail to Westelton and drop her off at this safe house, while the kingdom of Arendelle pays the reward. Sounds easy enough, though I have to admit, I'm rather impressed with this 'Lady Genova' she actually offered to come with us, even after I pulled the 'lonely crew' card. Very impressive."

Suddenly, the door to his quarters burst open to reveal Andrews. Roberts and Kay re-sheathed their swords and sat back down as the quartermaster shut the door and stormed to the table.

"What the HELL were you thinking?!" Andrews' eyes were wide and frantic; to Roberts it almost looked as though Andrews was scared.

"Andrews," Roberts started calmly, but Kay cut him off, glaring at Andrews.

"Cool it!" Kay said sharply "I know, the second lady wasn't part of the contract but-"

"What?!" Cried Andrews, staring daggers at them both, "I'm not talking about Gerda! Why didn't you tell me?! Why did I have to walk into the brig and see HER there?!"

"Andrews," Roberts repeated louder, but still the quartermaster ignored him.

"We agreed!" Andrews continued furiously, "we signed the code, we ALL did and you didn't think that TELLING me would be a good thing?! Did you think I would just NOT NOTICE that-"

"ANNA!" Roberts shouted, and the shouting stopped, but began again,

"DON'T 'Anna' me _Gawain_," she growled, she opened her mouth to continue but Kay cut her off.

"Anna, please, what the HELL are you talking about? The only people in the brig are that Gerda woman and Lady Genova, who we already talked about. What are you so mad about?"

Anna stopped and stared at the both of them, and then let out a curse, "Crabbers lied. That's no 'Lady Genova', Kaleb."

Anna took a deep breath and stared out the window of the Captains quarters, watching the flag with the chained skeleton and door being lowered off the mast, the flag that had been with them for so long before turning back to the two of them.

"The woman in the brig is no 'Lady Genova'," the quartermaster said slowly, "it's my sister; Queen Elsa of Arendelle."

* * *

**Sorry for any confusion, I'll put some translations for the "Pirate Speak" that I wrote in;**

**Colors/jolly roger= Pirate Flag**

**Port= Left side of ship**

**Starboard= Right side of ship**

**Prow= Front**

**Stern= Back**

**Quartermaster= Second in command, in charge of Crew, and leads raids on other ships**

**Mate= In charge of giving out jobs around the ship and keeping peace between crew members**

**Bosun= Third in command, higher than a mate, but under quartermaster; in charge of the status of the ship (quality of the rigging/ropes, sails, how much gunpowder, and weapons are in the hold, etc.)**

**Gunner= In charge of weapons such as how much gunpowder, and weapons are in the hold, and making sure that all the crew's swords/firearms are combat ready.**

**Navigator= In charge of maps, recognizing flags of different nations, and even communicating with other ships through flag signals, and measuring distance/finding routes to take**

"**Bless me barnacles"= (figure of speech, basically the pirate equivalent of 'holy cow' or 'I don't believe it')**


	3. Chapter 2: Intel and Insects

**BatteriezNotIncluded here, just want to say thank you for being patient in waiting for this chapter, my muse decided to take some time off :-( **

**As usual, everything belongs to Disney (except the OC's)**

**Enjoy!**

* * *

Chapter 2

_Seven Years Ago: two weeks after running away_

The six pirate wannabes were sweaty, dirty, and had never felt better in their lives. The sensation of freedom ran through them with an incredible feeling. Gawain was at the wheel of _The Junker_, as they had jokingly started calling the floating hunk of wood they were currently sailing (or trying to at least). For Anna, through all two weeks, her smile had never wavered, even finding out there wasn't technically a toilet. For the first time in forever she was _free_. She wasn't the spare, or a princess, or being yelled at to sit up straight, or be ladylike. Sure she wasn't _totally_ free of responsibilities. She had to help the boys clean, and do basic maintenance on _The Junker_ to make sure they didn't wake up to the darn thing sinking in their sleep.

Gawain was steering the ship, sometimes taking turns with Chatterbox, whenever Gawain simply got too tired and cold to do it. Smarts was in the lower hold, looking at the new maps and getting use to all the new navigation instruments. The rest of them were simply getting used to unfurling the sails, adjusting the rigging, and finding out the different parts of a ship.

According to Gawain, the first place they needed to go was a place town called Tortuga. From Gawain's description, it was an incredibly seedy place, to put it lightly, and the kind of place that would probably give her parents a heart attack if they ever found out Anna was going there. The one thing Anna was disappointed at was that they weren't flying their flag, but Gawain had (wisely) pointed out that flying a pirate flag while still in Arendelle waters with a runaway Princess on board probably wasn't the best idea.

One of these days, Anna and Kaleb were sparring. They were pretty evenly matched, although while Anna excelled in combining her attacks in quick finesse, Kaleb swung his sword savagely, focusing on brute strength. Even though the swords were in no way dulled, both of them were smiling as they attacked and parried the other.

"Come on, Kaleb," Anna taunted rolling behind the big teenager, "at least try to fight."

Kaleb grinned back as he swung his sword in straight arc, "at least I don't fight like a girl!"

"Oh, you're going to pay for that one!" Anna laughed, glaring playfully at the bigger boy, as she dodged his sword.

Suddenly Gawain let out a cry, and the two stopped fighting and ran over to him, stopping when they saw him face palming repeatedly.

"Stupid, stupid, stupid," he cursed angrily, glaring furiously.

"Who's stupid?" Anna asked cautiously.

"Me," he groaned and looked at Anna apologetically, "Kaleb, mind getting the others out here? I just remembered something important we need to do before we get to port."

Kaleb turned and left, leaving Gawain, and a very confused Anna.

"So," Anna began slowly, "what's going on?"

"I'm really sorry Anna," began Gawain, looking at her apologetically, "but, you're going to need a disguise."

Anna blinked, "what? Why?"

"Girls are considered bad luck on ships, I know: it's stupid," he told her before she could object, "but when we eventually get a full crew, no one will want to join us if there's a woman on board," he paused and then winked slyly at her, "unless they don't _know_ there's a woman on board."

Anna pouted, "Do I have to?" she whined, but nodded.

Gawain grinned, "Don't worry, you shouldn't have to cut your hair, just keep it in the braided pigtails, and hid those in a hat or hood. The only other thing you need to worry about now is your voice. "

"And her name," added Chatterbox, coming up to them, followed by Kaleb and the others.

"Oh, right," said Gawain sheepishly, "any ideas?"

"Andrew." Said Pike, as Smoke said, "Anders."

"Soooo, Andrews?" asked Anna, looking confused.

They looked among one another and slowly nodded, Anna looked at Gawain but he simply shrugged.

"It's your name." he said simply, and slowly, Anna nodded.

"I like it," she said after a moment, "Andrews it is."

"Well get you some better clothes when we get to Tortuga," Gawain spoke, looking at each of them, "speaking of names, we should all have aliases, except for you three." He gestured to Pike, Smoke and Chatterbox.

"How about Roberts," suggested Anna, "he was a really feared pirate in one of the books I've read?"

"Works for me," Said Gawain, grinning again, "what about you Kaleb?"

"Kay," he grunted simply, and shrugged.

"Right then," stated Gawain/Roberts, and grinned, "I wanted to call all of you here so I we can vote on who gets to do what when we get a proper ship and a real crew."

"Well I'm already cook," Pike grinned, "and besides, your Captain, don't you get to pick out jobs?"

"Well yeah," agreed Gawain slowly, "but the crew has to approve. I would say, Smarts is navigator, Kay is the first mate, Smoke would make a good Gunner, Chatterbox would be Bosun, and Anna- sorry _Andrews_ I would like to be quartermaster."

"Quartermaster is second in command," stated Chatterbox, "why her?"

Gawain stared at him simply, "Quartermaster is someone who has the respect of the crew, who leads the attacks on the other vessels, and has the power to veto the captain. I want my quartermaster to be someone that everyone can get along with, someone that will be respected as a person, those are the kinds of people that are good leaders, and Anna is naturally likable. She'll be perfect, she has a good head on her shoulders, and she already has you guys running around without needing to bark orders or anything, it just comes naturally with her. It would be a shame to waste that kind of talent."

Anna looked touched as the boys slowly nodded, and then each agreed to their jobs and the assigned positions of the others. _Quartermaster_, Anna thought excitedly, _I'm a quartermaster, not a spare or a princess. I'm needed, and important. I won't mess this up, and I won't let them down!_

* * *

Tortuga was just as nasty as Roberts had made it sound, if not more so. The whole town seemed to reek of rum and salt, and looked as though it had been made from leftover ship parts. _Remember Anna_, she thought to herself_, here, you're Andrews, and Gawain is Roberts. Don't forget and don't mess this up, this is your fresh start, no more being the spare._

Roberts walked purposely to an old shabby looking building (if you could even call it a building), and walked inside. It was a bar of sorts, and Anna (_no Andrews, I'm Andrews here, _she chided herself) followed him to the front. He waited patiently as the barman slowly took them in.

"Waddaya want, kids?" He asked his voice grating again against Andrews' ears.

Roberts smiled slightly, "A drink, this _is_ a bar, ain't it?"

The man grunted and turned to get their drinks. Roberts smiled and looked back at them "okay, walk around the bar and see if you hear anything interesting. Stay out of the middle, don't start any fights, and only sit at a table if you have to. Got it?" they nodded, grabbed their drinks, and split up.

The inside of the bar was dirty, but had a strange golden glow to it. The walls were covered in animal heads, which gave Anna the strange sensation of being stared at. She took a sip of her drink, and tried desperately not to choke. _It's probably supposed to be rum_, she thought sourly, as she passed a rather loud bunch of men sitting at a table.

"-especially with that new shipment coming in from Weselton. Poor blokes, barely in manhood and being thrown into debtors' prison because their parents couldn't cough up. Apparently it's all for 'Duke Duck' to show off his new warship."

Anna froze, and slowly turned to the men at the table, "What was that about a warship?"

The men turned to look at her, and one of them scoffed, "have ye been under a rock? Ev'ryone knows about the new Weselton ship, supposedly the crown jewel of the Duck's fleet, three masted beauty with, double cannon decks on each side. Ev'ry bilge rat from 'ere to the Southern Isles knows about it."

_Andrews_ glowered, "been at sea for the past two weeks, just got into port actually." She tried to mimic the gruff accent that she had heard from the tavern's patrons. The men looked at her and slowly nodded. "Fair enough, word only reached us a week ago."

_Okay, I need to be subtle about this_, "the rumors you heard wouldn't by chance 'ave included the route the ship was takin' would it?" _Okay, maybe I need to work on subtlety._ She silently cursed herself as the men looked at each other with a greedy gleam in their eyes. She quietly looked around for Ga_\- Roberts _and tried to signal him over, but he either didn't see her or was having his own problems.

"I might know, but me memory is a little… foggy. Mind sweet'n it up a bit?" said the man with a yellow teethed grin?"

"That depends," Said Andrews, trying to sound tough, "On how clear your memory is."

The man scowled, and beckoned his friends into a huddle. Meanwhile Anna reached into her pocket and felt to see how many coins she had. Suddenly she felt something sharp against her fingers, after feeling around, she realized it was a snowflake necklace; the last gift Elsa had ever given her before her isolation. One of the men grabbed her hand and yanked. She tried to extricate her fingers from the chain, but too late, the necklace came out of her pocket with her hand. The men eyed the necklace greedily.

"That's solid silver that is, and a sapphire in the middle by the looks of it," one of the men commented smiling sickly, "I'd say that would rouse our memories real good." Anna's eyes darkened, "not this," she said firmly, "I'll give you coin, but not this."

"Then we have a problem," said the man, his eyes just as dark as hers.

"An' what problem would that be, I wonder?" it was Roberts, with Kay standing behind him.

"And how is this your business, kid?" the man glowered.

"They know about a Weselton warship, that's transporting blokes to debtors' prison, but this gentlemen here won't share the route."

"I will too tell the route, for tha' silver snowflake."

"And I told you I would give you gold instead," Anna glowered. Roberts looked at the necklace and seemed to recognize it. He put a hand on Anna's shoulder and reached into his own pocket, and pulled out one of her brooches, which she had taken the night she was thrown out. "How about you tell me, for this?" Said Roberts with a smile, tossing the gold brooch from hand to hand teasingly, it's rubies flashing in the light. One of the men licked their lips, and nodded to the others, "Done." The leader held out his hand but Roberts pulled his hand back and waved a finger. The men glared but relented.

"It's going to port in Corona, to be shown off, and get supplies before heading to the Southern Isles to drop off the lads to debtors prison." Roberts tossed the brooch to the man and carefully steered Anna out of the tavern. When they were back on the beach Roberts turned to her, "why?"

Anna knew what he was asking; why did she not want to trade the necklace? The truth was Anna didn't want to part with something that served as the last reminder of a time when her family, Elsa included, loved her. The necklace reminded her of all the fun they had had; all the snowmen, the snowball fights, the hot chocolates afterwards. The necklace was a symbol of her best memories, and even if her family, Elsa included, had thrown her to the wolves, she wasn't ready to give up on them, not yet anyway. She sighed and looked and looked at Gawain, and he seemed to understand, and he motioned at _The Junker_.

"Next stop," He said, his voice laced with determination, "Corona."

* * *

Corona really was a beautiful kingdom, even if some of its splendor had faded, along with its joyous mood when the princess was lost. To Anna, and the boys, however it looked as beautiful as could be especially with the large three masted warship, with the name The Neptune, painted on the prow, with the Weselton flag flying high on its highest mast. It really was rather stupid of the Duke to have it sail all the way to Corona alone, but none of them were going to complain, as it would be hard enough to steal the boat while dealing with its rather large, armed crew. _The Junker_ was just pulling into Corona waters when Anna suddenly heard Smoke curse.

"Looks like the Duck decided to come personally," he grimaced, glaring through his spyglass.

"Why do they call him that?" Anna asked curiously, and Smoke grinned, "you mean why does everyone call him 'duke duck'?" Anna nodded, and Smoke giggled, "Because they say that when he dances he looks like a cross between a duck and a chicken with its head cut off."

Anna let out a snort at that and took out a spyglass of her own and looked through it to the warship. _Those men at the tavern may have been drunk, but they sure weren't exaggerating when they said that ship was amazing._ Indeed, it was; with its white sails, and green and silver trim, as well as the cannons protruding from the sides and even the front of the prow, and the blue figurehead that overlooked the harbor, the ship looked like piece of art. Judging by the looks on the other's faces, she guessed that they were enamored with the ship as well.

"How the hell are we going to get past all of those guards?" asked Pike frowning. Anna was secretly wondering the same thing: the vessel was practically crawling with armed guards and crewmen, while the 'Duck' was pompously walking across the deck. After a moment, it looked like the duke had seen something not to his liking and began to yell at some poor cabin boy. His two body guards grabbed the boy by the scruff of the neck and punched him in the gut, before throwing him off to the side. Anna felt her jaw tighten at the spectacle, especially when it looked like some of the crewmen were laughing at the poor boy.

"Let's go on land, and you three follow him, meanwhile, I'm going to see if I can make some friends." Gawain ordered and the crew split up, heading for land.

* * *

Gawain couldn't help but smile as he saw the Corona Mail Company at the edge of Corona, where the docks met the inner city. Being in so central to the world map, Corona was where all mail that was to be sent and sorted, ready to be mailed across the kingdoms. The entire company was huge, and royally funded, which kept the kingdom of Corona bountiful. He slowly made it to the central office and suddenly heard the sound of a scuffle. Never able to stay out of a good fight, Roberts followed the sound, hand on his sword, when he spotted two familiar faces; the Stabbington Brothers. They appeared to be holding a boy about eight by the scruff of the neck and scaring him. Both were smirking and muttering to the boy in low tones. The boys face paled, and Roberts decided to step in.

"Threatening a little boy, that's not very sporting" Roberts said, sword in hand.

The Brothers scowled and the one in front turned and spoke impatiently, "this is none of your concern boy, leave now and we won't kill you."

"How about, you leave the boy alone permanently, and _I_ won't kill _you"_ Roberts smiled coldly, tapping his sword on the side of his foot.

The Brothers pulled out their own swords and charged, Roberts grinned widened and parried, one and slashed at the other hitting one across the eye, the Brother clutched his face and scowled, the other brother roared and came around again. Roberts ducked and slashed his sword, angling it to get under the Brother's sword, and he clutched his mouth. The brothers looked around saw guards coming towards them, the Brothers glared at Roberts and ran. One of the Guards looked at Roberts, gave him a thankful nod, and ran after the brothers. Gawain turned and walked into the alley where the boy was looking bewildered.

"You-you beat them," he said stupidly, then broke into a grin, "Thanks man! They've been being meanies to me forever!"

Roberts chuckled, "those kinds of people are like that. But why were they bothering you."

"They were angry that I wasn't playing the game fast enough." The boy said sadly, when Roberts looked confused, the boy pulled out a pad of paper, and showed the Pirate. "I take the numbers and symbols and make them into secret messages! It's really fun and they gave me candy for it, but they were angry that I didn't do it faster. But it's not my fault, my dad made me go to the sorting room for the weekend because he caught me out past my bedtime."

"I take it your dad is a post master?" Roberts asked, the boy slowly, the little boy grinned and nodded.

"Yeah!" the boy grinned excitedly, "he just got pro… pro…" the boy frowned deep in thought.

"Promotion?" Gawain asked and the boy grinned and nodded. Then he stopped for a moment and thrust out his hand, "I'm Rascal, at least that's what everyone calls me, and I'm a runner for the Corona Mail Company." The little boy puffed out his chest proudly.

"I'm Roberts, I'm a privateer, and I have a proposition for you; I'll pay you money for your game, and when you're older you and I can decide how much you need."

The Little boy grinned, "Sure mister," and then frowned, how will I send you the answers?" Roberts grinned and wrote a small address in the dirt, an old house that Gawain had been born in. long since abandoned, but not completely abandoned. "Send them here."

"Can I ask you a question," Roberts asked, and the boy nodded, "do you know anything about that big ship from Weselton?"

"Oh, you mean The Neptune, the one with the blue figurehead?" Roberts nodded, and the boy continued, "My dad told me that it's supposed to be the fastest ship ever built, and is supposed to be carrying people who did bad stuff. He also told me that the Duke is carrying a lot of money on the ship, so he can buy stuff when he makes port, but that he's going to leave tomorrow."

Roberts grinned, and gave Rascal a few coins, "thanks kid, I'll keep in touch. Just one more thing; what did the message the Brothers want you to tell them?"

Rascal grinned, "Oh, it said something about a convoy heading for the Southern Isles, that's supposed to have a LOT of money on it. Anyway, thanks mister!"

Roberts watched Rascal run back to the mail office, a thoughtful look on his face. He smiled softly and slowly made his way back to _The Junker_.

* * *

Anna was bored. 'Duke Duck' was by far the creepiest person she had ever laid eyes on. He had quickly shown his traits as a full-blown jerk, from telling his guards to beat up young kids, to monologuing his political plans to no one in particular. Personally, Anna was beginning to question the man's sanity as the day wore on. Out of the corner of her eyes, she saw Smarts roll his eyes at the Duke's antics.

Duck turned and walked briskly into a large building with the Corona seal on the archway above the door. Anna assumed it was some kind of political building, _shame I didn't pay attention to those in my lessons, oh well Elsa would probably know… _Anna froze, and shook her head violently trying to rid herself of thoughts of certain people. Kay quirked an eyebrow at her and she glared at him.

"So…" Smarts began slowly, "don't most Corona buildings have skylights?"

Kay nodded and reached into his sack and grabbed a long coil of rope. "After you, Quartermaster."

Anna huffed, tied the rope to her waist, and began to climb. Once she was at the top she carefully tied the end of the rope to a pillar and went over to the various skylights. After three empty rooms, and a bathroom (_seriously, who puts a skylight in a bathroom_? Thought Anna) she saw the Duck, his guards, and three other official looking men enter the room. Quickly, Anna reached into her pouch, pulled out her lock-picks, and opened the skylight.

"—as their closest partner in trade, I can honestly say that I have no idea what caused the decision," the Duck was saying, his nasally voice sounding proper, "the king and queen refuse to reveal any hints on what caused them to close the gates. The only thing I can say for certain is that the only time one is allowed inside is when doing business when a meeting is scheduled in advance, which is rather unfortunate as I would _love_ to drop by for a pleasant visit on occasion."

Anna felt a tap on her shoulder and saw Kay and Smarts looking at her frowning, "what did we miss?" whispered Smarts, jerking his thumb at the four officials.

Anna rolled her eyes and shook her head, "nothing." She whispered back, and the three of them turned their attention back on the four officials, who were now discussing a shipment of gunpowder that had come in recently.

Anna had to admit, listening to politics from the roof, was not much better than when she had had to learn from her tutor. It was complicated, boring, she didn't understand most of it, (and judging by the looks on Kay and Smarts, they didn't either). While waiting for anything interesting she peeked over around the roof for something to occupy herself, when she suddenly spotted a very large spider near the window they were looking at. Carefully she pulled out a handkerchief and picked up the spider, and slowly brought it over toward the window, a wicked gleam in her eyes. Smarts peeked over to her, did a double take on what was in the cloth, and violently shook his head. He reached over and tried to grab the spider, but instead grabbed the kerchief, and after a brief tug of war, the spider went flying.

Kay, Smarts and Anna watched in horror, as the large spider fell in seemingly slow motion, tumbling through the air. Anna snatched the kerchief and stuffed it back in her pocket as the spider continued to fall, when in suddenly made its landing… on the nose of one of the guards. There was silence in the room, as the three-wannabe pirates looked at each other in horror, before they heard the un-manliest scream any of them had ever heard.

"GET IT OFF!" the man shrieked, suddenly hitting himself in the nose, knocking the Duke's spectacles off in the process. Immediately, he started running around the room, his two guards chased after him, the other dignitaries following closely after. After several laps around the room, with an insane amount of high-pitched squealing, the Duck ran out of the room, with the guards, and representatives close behind. The three of them looked at one another, too stunned to speak, until Anna burst out laughing. She was quickly joined by Kay and Smarts, until they had to stop due to their shortness of breath and stitches in their sides. They quickly made their way to the rendezvous with Roberts, who was waiting for them at the docks. Seeing their grins, he arched an eyebrow, and the three of them quickly explained what had happened. As the story unfolded, a small smile appeared on Roberts' face.

"Andrews," he said with a smirk, "two things; one, you're a genius, and two, I know how we're going to get that ship."

"How?" asked Kay, frowning, and Roberts grinned again before answering.

"We're going to kidnap the Duke."

* * *

**Yeah yeah, I know, lots of filler, but it's important for later chapters okay. Follow, Favorite and Review please.**

**Peace out.**


	4. Chapter 3: Going Out With a Bang

**I got inspired and I hope you enjoy the chapter. Other than that I have a couple points I need to go over;**

** 1) I beta all of my own stories so if you see something wrong, PLEASE tell me**

** 2) Please review. I give brownie points to those with constructive criticism (though keep in mind this is my first fanfic)**

** 3) This chapter is dedicated to Monty Oum. His creativity was limitless and was an inspiration to many. May he rest in peace.**

* * *

Chapter 3

_Seven Years ago; Continued_

Anna grimaced staring down at the deck of _The Neptune_ thankful for her drawn hood shielding her from the wind and cold. W_hy me_? She grimaced, thinking of what she now had to do. She had to admit, Gawain's plan was genius, but it was also suicidal, for her at least. So there she was high in the rigging of the Weselton ship waiting for Kay's signal holding a bag of live spiders, with Smoke and Gawain hanging off the side off the boat somewhere. Suddenly she saw it, a small flicker of candlelight, waving in an arc, then flames climbing higher and higher, before she heard the faint tolling of alarm bells. Quickly Anna scaled down the rigging and looked around for the Duck's guards. She quickly saw them stationed outside the captain's cabin, looking serious. Anna grinned and quickly tiptoed her way across one of the cross beams on the masts, until she was directly above the guard, by about twenty feet, and dumped the bag of spiders on top of him.

The chaos was instantaneous; horrified shrieks and screams could suddenly be heard all over the deck, as the one guard started running in a panic, and the other chased after him, several men came running out from below deck, blades drawn to see what was the matter, only to be run over by the panicking guards. Anna quickly dropped down and landed with a soft thump before drawing her sword, and breaking the door open. The Duck and the Captain looked up from their maps, and seeing her; a hooded figure in the doorway with a sword drawn, the captain quickly drew his own sword and charged. Anna parried, and for the first time in forever, was thankful of all the sword training she had done with the other boys, while out of the castle. The Captain was strong, his thick sword seemed better suited for a knight in an arena rather than a close the quarters of the cabin, and Anna tried to use that to her advantage. Going in close she swung her sword in a dance, trying to keep the man on his toes, and the Captain struggled to keep up with her quick swings, until finally; he thrust his sword down, sending it crashing toward her skull. Anna reacted on instinct, arching her sword to catch his, and redirecting the momentum at him. Both of their swords connected with the captain's neck, and the man was no more.

The Duke, who had been cowering under the table, let out a squeal of terror, and Anna, her head still rushing from adrenaline, pointed her bloody sword at him, making him go still.

"You're coming with me," she said deepening her voice, and grabbed the scruff of his neck and pressed her blade to his neck. Quickly, she half ran half dragged the Duck out of the Cabin and ran off the deck. Before she could leave the Duck screamed, "SAVE ME!" and the guards on the deck ran after her, leaving the ship almost completely devoid of people. It was deserted enough that no one noticed two figures sneaking below deck, swords drawn.

* * *

Roberts grinned, at the Andrews' retreating figure, with the Duck in tow. _She sure knows how to cause a ruckus_, he thought proudly, thinking of all her stories of chaos when she lived in Arendelle. Quickly, he signaled to Smoke and the two of them climbed on board the ship, and snuck below decks.

"Now to find those prisoners," muttered Smoke, after knocking out a guard. The two of them continued to sneak around the ship, travelling through several storage rooms, and even the crew's quarters, before suddenly, they found another trapdoor, with a ladder leading down. Quickly, and quietly, the two boys went down, hid behind a crate, and quickly looked around. This was the bottom of the ship, one-half of it was devoted to storage, and the other half was guarded by four guards, with both swords and pistols. Roberts grimaced muttering, "this is gunna hurt," before putting a hand on his sword.

Suddenly a hand gently touched his and he twisted in surprise. Behind him stood the boy who he had seen being beaten by the Duck's men when they had sailed into Corona. The boy's face was heavily scarred, and was bigger than Roberts had first seen, perhaps as big as Kay. The boy put his finger to his lips, and gave Roberts and Smoke two rolls of cloth.

"Use these to cover your swords," he whispered his voice naturally harsh and grating, as if his throat was scarred as well.

"Why are you helping us?" whispered Smoke, confused, and the boy grinned lopsidedly, as one of his scars was across his lips and prevented the left side from moving.

"One; I hate those bastards," he gestured the guards, "and two, my little brother is in there." He gestured to the door.

"What's your name lad?" asked Roberts eyeing the scarred teen.

The boy smiled humorlessly and said, "Call me Scar."

Roberts nodded, "just so you know as the soon to be famous pirate Roberts, I'm taking the ship, I hope you don't mind," If possible Scar's grin widened, "Be my guest. Follow my lead."

They nodded and followed Scar, with cloth bundles hiding their weapons. Scar walked up to the guards and cleared his throat, and lowered his head, hunching his shoulders, as if to appear smaller that he actually was. "Let us through, sirs, we need to put these with the rest of the sail repair swatches." The men rolled their eyes, unlocked the door, and pushed the boys through, before shutting the door again. Roberts winked at Smoke, and Smoke promptly tripped 'accidently' knocking into one of the guards. The man snarled, rammed his fist into Smokes stomach before kicking into the next room, and slammed the door behind the three of them.

Roberts carefully knelt beside Smoke and carefully helped him up, carful to keep his weapons concealed. "You okay?" he asked quietly. Smarts grimaced, and slowly held up a ring of keys, careful not to let the other guards see. Roberts slowly nodded and took a spare dagger out of his boot and passed it to Smarts, nodding again.

The room was filled with cells (which were more like cages) lining up both sides of the ship, leaving only a small space in between for a pathway. Each cage was filled with people, mostly young, some on the older side. All of them were dirty, and looked like they needed a good meal. Roberts grimaced again, and casually snuck behind a guard, that he saw had a pistol. He peeked over and saw Smoke standing behind two other guards, his own dagger in hand as well as Gawain's. Roberts quickly grabbed the man and slammed his head into the nearest cage, just as Smoke stabbed the daggers into the two other guard's throats. There was a sudden hush over the prisoners. Roberts, held out the keys, and jingled them to get the prisoner's attention.

"Gentlemen," Roberts began, "I am commandeering this ship, am in need of a crew to do so… any takers?"

* * *

Anna continued running, jumping on a few crates and climbing up to the rooftops of a Corona storage building, before putting her free running skills to good use, running, jumping, ducking, and dodging her pursuers. _Yeash, they must have had an entire military unit on that ship_, Anna winced as she looked at the number of pursuers, chasing after her and her prisoner. She was doing every trick she knew, trying desperately to keep out of her enemies reach, but keeping them close enough to continue chasing her. Finally she reached the checkpoint that they had agreed on, and she turned to the Duke, and said, "Well, nice meeting you, Duck of Weaseltown," before throwing him off the roof. The soldiers scrambled to catch the tiny man, as the Dukes face turned beet red before screaming after her, "IT'S _DUKE_ OF _WESELTON_!"

Anna continued to sprint across the rooftops, carefully lighting a match, before dropping on a roof that they had coated in oil the previous day. The abandoned building burst into flames and Anna leaped off the building as the heat pressed against her back, and she heard the soldiers scream behind her. She leapt off the roof and rolled on the ground, and continued to run through the alleyways. Finally, she found the alley that Kay was hiding in, waiting impatiently.

"'Bout time you showed up," Kaleb grunted, to which Anna huffed in response, "let's just get out of here, shall we?"

Kaleb nodded and the two of them ran through the alley, on the rooftops, and back toward the docks. The two of them heard yelling and screaming coming from the Weselton warship, and quickly drew their weapons, before grabbing ropes and leaping onto the ship.

The deck was chaos; soldiers and sailors were locked in combat with people that were clearly the prisoners, some with pistols, others with swords, and a few with improvised weapons like planks of wood. Several of the soldiers were being thrown off the boat, while other soldiers were simply jumping off to save the rioters the trouble. At the helm of the ship was Roberts fighting off three different men with Smoke, and two other boys; a large boy that had several noticeable scars all over his body, and a smaller boy that looked slightly gangly with wiry black hair. Anna sprinted forward, and slammed her sword into one of the soldier's heads and threw him over the side of the boat. Kay decided to choose that moment to slam his fist into one of the soldiers fighting Roberts, knocking him through the air and off the side. They heard a loud yell as several of the former prisoners charged forward and finished off the last off the soldiers.

"All right lads," Roberts yelled to the now soldier less ship, "Raise the mains and colors, hoist the anchor, and let's get the hell out of here!"

The men jumped to fulfill the orders of their new captain, and slowly, _The Neptune_ began to turn out of the Corona port. Roberts shouted something to the wiry boy, and he practically jumped onto the rigging and climbed into the crow's nest, a spyglass in his teeth, as Roberts strode over to the ship's wheel and took it in his hands.

Anna jogged over to Roberts' side, and looked around at their new crew. It looked as though most of them were sixteen or older, most of them looking as though it had been a long time since they had a decent meal. Almost all of them had a look on their face that seemed to tell her that they had nowhere to go, or had lost everything. As she stood, she got a good look at the boy who had been helping Roberts and Smoke. He was very big, though lean, his skin an olive color, and his black hair wild, reminding her of a lion's mane, and his face (as well as most of his body) was covered in scars, including one over his acid green eyes.

Roberts saw her looking and grinned, "Andrews, this is Scar, Scar, meet the quartermaster of this fine ship, Andrews." Scar looked at her and nodded, and then pointed to the boy in the crow's nest, "that's my brother, Hawkeye." He said in a strange raspy, yet baritone voice.

"Everyone seems to know what they're supposed to do well enough," Anna commented in her 'Andrews' voice. Roberts nodded, "I gave them a little crash course in sailing while we were getting them out, so they'll know the basics, after where home free, we'll sort them properly."

A voice rang from the top of the crow's nest; "Corona warships inbound; Two frigates, by the looks of it!"

"Thanks Hawkeye," Roberts yelled at the kid and then turned to Smoke who was running around the deck, "prepare the mortar and rear cannons!"

Smoke jumped slightly and grabbed a few men and they went pelting to their respective stations, with Smoke yelling instructions.

Roberts turned the ship slightly and then turned to Anna, "I think it's time that _The Junker_ went out with a bang, don't you, Quartermaster Andrews?"

Anna smiled and yelled in her deepened voice, "Keep the sails steady! Gunners, ready the cannons and mortar for the lone Schooner!"

Anna watched as the two warships came toward The Junker, one on either side. Anna smiled humorlessly, as she saw a small rowboat approach their ship with Pike and Smarts waving like crazy, with the little rowboat filled with their few possessions and the remaining gunpowder. The gunpowder now in _The Junker_'s hold… the same gunpowder shipment that the Duck and the representatives had spoken of before the spider incident, which was now packed into the little two masted Schooner. She waited until the two warships were almost next to the little ship, yelling for the mortar to be ready. She waited carefully, calculating the delay just as she had practiced with Smoke (on the several occasions she had skipped her princess lessons to hang out with the boys).

The two ships entered position and she yelled at Smoke to fire. _The Junker_ exploded, shattering the hulls of the two pursuing ships causing them to begin to sink. Their new crew cheered as Anna yelled at them to pull up the rowboat containing Pike, Smarts and the rest of their belongings, and then yelled at them to lower the remaining sails, as their new ship shot off, Corona vanishing into the distance, their flag of chained skeletons and the blood-red snowflake adorned door flying defiantly in the wind.


	5. Chapter 4: Between Rocks and Hard Places

**See bottom for author's note.**

**I Do Not Own _Anything_, Disney does! (so please don't sue me!)**

* * *

Chapter 4

_Present day_

It was very safe to say that the six-month Queen of Arendelle was _not_ having a good day. As if it wasn't bad enough that she had needed to go to Corona on a _ship,_ especially after what had happened three and a half years ago with her parents and… (She preferred not to think about it), _then_ she there was that storm, which had brought back said memories with a vengeance leaving their ship crippled and adrift, and _now_ she had been kidnapped by pirates. _This cannot possibly get any worse,_ Queen Elsa thought, her mouth trying to curl into a scowl, but she kept her face neutral.

Suddenly she heard a voice and the door to the rows of cage/cells where she and Gerda were being kept opened revealing a rather lean and well-muscled individual. He wore brown pants, brown boots that went halfway to his knees, and a long faded and hooded cloak that was a deep forest green that hid the man's face. He wore two pistols across his chest and a hand-and-a-half sword hanging from his belt (which Elsa found odd as, she thought all pirates used cutlasses or rapiers), and seemed to be carrying a large roll of cloth over his shoulder. The man suddenly tripped over his own boots and the cloth roll went flying, landing on top of the pirate. One of the guards ran over to the man and picked up the roll off of him and helped the man to his feet.

"What a time for your famous clumsiness to make an appearance, eh Mr. Andrews?" the guard joked, and the man- Mr. Andrews- glared at him, "one more word outta you and I'll have you cleaning the head!" Though this _Mr. Andrews_ said this with a serious tone, his face (or what she could see of it under the hood) was light and joking. The guard laughed heartily, and raised his hands in mock surrender, "aye Quartermaster, sir!" and with a playful salute; he gave the roll cloth back to the quartermaster. _So, this Andrews fellow is the quartermaster_, Elsa thought _he seems well respected, and not as violent as most high-ranking pirate officials are_. As the quartermaster got to his feet, his face turned at for a moment she saw the man's dark, deep blue eyes meet hers. The quartermaster froze, eyes widening as if he was seeing a ghost, and saw a name leave the man's lips in a high strangled whisper; "Elsa?"

The queen's blood ran cold, and she felt fear grip her insides. _Conceal, don't feel_, she desperately repeated in her head _how does he this pirate know who I am?_ Thanking her lucky stars that the pirates had not taken her gloves, she desperately tried to calm down to keep ice from starting to spread. As it was, she saw the guard's breath began to fog as the temperature started to drop.

The guard looked at the quartermaster, "what was that?" he asked frowning slightly

The quartermaster seemed to remember himself, and said, "_Also_… I said also remember to keep out of the rum, you remember what happened last time, right?" Mr. Andrews said it jokingly, though Elsa noticed his voice was still rather strained. The guard didn't notice and belted out another laugh.

"Take this to the sail stack will you? I… I just remembered I need to talk to the captain about something." Mr. Andrews said, his voice still slightly strangled, and without another word shoved the cloth roll into the guards' hands and practically ran out of the hold.

* * *

Elsa did not know how long she had been trapped in the cage; all she had to go on was the guard rotations, but even that was inconsistent. During her wait, she had had nothing to do to keep the worst-case scenarios from spiraling out of control. _Lady Genova was supposed to be a safe cover, no one was supposed to know that it was I traveling,_ Elsa's thoughts swirled through her head like a maelstrom. _Then there's that quartermaster… I know he said my name, as much as I wish he hadn't, but how did he know who I was? Only Gerda and the Captain were supposed to know my true identity, not to mention the route we were taking, but how did these pirates find out, or was it simply an accident that we crossed paths?_

Elsa had already tried speaking to Gerda in the next cell, though she could not ask the questions she truly wanted, especially with the pirates standing watch over them. At first, Elsa had been furious with Gerda for insisting on being captured as well, as she couldn't bear for anything to happen to the old maid. Nevertheless, eventually she became somewhat glad of the maid's presence and loyalty, and also providing something remotely familiar to the now unfamiliar and hostile environment. _Well, _she amended, _aside from…_

The only other thing that troubled her was the quartermaster, Andrews. Somehow, the man seemed familiar, for when she had seen his eyes, she could have sworn that they were startlingly familiar, though no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't place where she had seen him. She had thought hard trying to place him; however, she only knew what his eyes and half his face looked like, so she had trouble thinking of anyone that might be even remotely close.

Aside from that, she also had to keep an especially close eye on her powers. She was certain that the pirates would not take kindly to someone with magic on their ship, but also figured it would not be a good idea to break out of the brig. With her powers, as she might accidently freeze or sink the whole ship in the process, and being prisoner so far was better than being dead at the bottom of the sea.

Elsa was suddenly ripped from her thoughts by a loud clang, and looking up she saw one of the pirates had opened her cell door. The man smiled and tossed her a dress, "You'll be dining with the captain tonight, and you'll be wearing that."

Elsa frowned, "and if do not wish to join the captain?"

The man's smile widened, and she felt a tremor of fear run down her spine, "he said if that was the case you would be dining with the crew," there was a pause as he and his friend exchanged greedy looks, "and you'd be naked."

Elsa picked up the dress and said, "The gloves stay." and the pirates exchanged looks of disappointment.

The two turned around grimacing, as she changed into the dress. She had to admit, it was a nice dress all things considered; a deep blue silk, with long sleeves and went down to her ankles. It hugged her body nicely and the neckline was surprisingly not as low as she had first suspected. She cleared her throat when she finished and held out her wrists for the men to undo the shackles. They eyed her greedily for a second, before unlocking her wrists, and leading her through the ship to the captain's quarters. The guard in the lead knocked on the door; she heard Roberts voice say 'enter' and the door opened.

The cabin was surprisingly roomy; the walls a rich wood color, with a desk behind the window, that was the whole back of the ship. The floor was a grayish wood and there was another table a few feet in front of the desk. The table was round and appeared as though it had been mostly used for sailing, judging by the several maps that had been poorly hidden in the corner of the room. There were several portraits hanging from the walls, many of them she recognized as priceless works of art that had gone missing mysteriously during transportation. Other things of interest she noticed were several sculptures around the room, various other works of art that had also been reported missing. The thing that surprised her most was the table; or rather the fact that the table was set as well as any table at the palace, with golden utensils, china plates, bread, a nicely cooked bird (goose it looked like) in a strangely luscious looking orange sauce. There were also several ornate candles strategically placed on the table, as well as a very expensive set of chairs, which faced each other. The captain sitting in one of the chairs, with a bucket of ice, which held what appeared like a _very_ expensive bottle of wine.

The pirate had not changed out of his usual knee high black boots, black pants, and loose fitting black shirt, nor his ridiculous mask that covered the top half of his face. Strangely enough, his sword, like his quartermaster, was a hand-and-a-half which was strapped across his back, and Elsa found herself idly wondering if the sword's blade was black as rumored. Roberts turned to her and slowly gestured to the lone chair sitting across from him, which she gracefully sat in. The pirate slowly took a dagger from his boot and stabbed it into the wine cork, yanking it out with a flourish and poured some of the dark liquid into both of their flutes.

"_Bon appetite_, and do try to enjoy, you have no idea how hard it is keeping half of this stuff fresh when on the open sea." He said with a small smile, which supposed most would have considered charming.

She eyed him for a moment and was rather surprised to see him eating with rather good manners, and not simply using his hands or dagger to eat as she had seen most sailors. In fact, he had table manners better than some dignitaries she had had the displeasure of eating with. He even, surprisingly enough, held and drank the wine in a proper manner. Slowly, she reached over, took some of the food, and began to eat.

The pirate captain glanced at her and his eyes narrowed slightly, and put his wine glass down with a soft thump, and let out a small curse. Elsa slowly raised her head, careful to keep her face neutral, and arched an eyebrow at him. He glanced at her apologetically and slowly reached into his pocket, and saw him pull out three golden coins. He turned to the far corner behind him and tossed the coins, which a hand swiftly caught before disappearing into the shadows of the corner again.

"Well," he said looked rather embarrassed, "that'll teach me to bet against my quartermaster, especially when my bosun agrees with him."

"I was the source of a bet?" she asked though it sounded more like a statement, her eyes narrowing slightly.

"Aye and I apologize for that," Roberts nodded, looking rather chastised, "my quartermaster hails from Arendelle, and told me of one, within the higher circles who followed every etiquette rule perfectly; except for taking her gloves off while eating."

Elsa's blood froze (figuratively) as she realized what he was implying. She struggled to keep her face neutral, but she had a feeling it was in vain, especially if that quartermaster was involved.

"Which is quite a shame really," Roberts continued, "as if I had known who you truly were, I would never have accepted a contract to kidnap a certain 'Lady Genova'."

Elsa found her neutral beginning to falter at this revelation, taking a sip of wine to wet her now dry throat. "You knew who I was then." She stated, shocked. "You knowingly tried to kidnap me. If I was your target, then why did you target my men? Why didn't you just take me hostage then and there and leave them out of it?"

Roberts actually squirmed in his seat slightly, looking rather uncomfortable, "I, uh, was hoping you would either reveal yourself out of fear, or that the captain would confirm your identity to save his men, but to be honest…" he squirmed again, with a look of… regret? "I never actually intended to harm any of your men. As you said yourself, my quarrel was not with them, and they had surrendered, and also… taking you willingly would make my job easier than dragging you into the hold kicking and screaming."

Elsa eyed him warily; the captain was either a very good liar, (which she doubted after six months of dealing with politics as queen), or he honestly had meant what he said, about not wanting to hurt anyone (at least, the horrible ways he had threatened). She slowly pushed the thought aside as she asked a question that had been nagging her for some time; "how did you know my route, which ship I would be on, and what did you mean you would not have kidnapped me if you had know who I was?"

Slowly Roberts reached under the table and gave her a rather large roll of paper. He nodded to it and spoke softly, "for you first two questions, the answer is simple; somebody really doesn't like you very much."

She eyed him suspiciously and carefully unfurled the roll and read it. Her eyes widened as she read through what she realized was a contract for her capture and delivery, clearly stating her planned route, and even mentioning the storm that her own crew had not known about until too late. Elsa could not help but let out a choking noise when she saw the reward for the completion of the contract. _That's more the two thirds of the whole Arendelle royal treasury,_ she thought, as she tried desperately tried to think about why anyone would want to kidnap her. She had been traveling to Corona to discuss renewing their alliance, they would have been discussing imports, exports, tariffs, and other important political things, but nothing warranting that amount, and certainly the name she had taken as her alias was not that well known, but not worth that amount either. Then she realized that the captain had not answered her third question, and slowly pointed it out to him.

Captain Roberts shifted uncomfortably in his seat before stating, "Only queen Elsa of Arendelle eats her meals with her gloves still on, and if there is one thing that can be said about the Dreaded Pirate Roberts, it is that he is _not_ stupid. The moment I got this ship, every one of my crew, myself included signed a contract of rules we would follow when we pillaged and plundered, and the first rule is, which was unanimously agreed upon I might add."

The captain took a deep breath before continuing:

"Pillage and Plunder any ship of merchant or lord, every lawman, and bank, but Never under any circumstances are we ever to get involved with a Royal, NO Exceptions.

The man who gave me this contract new that rule perfectly well and still had the gall to give it to me. Perhaps he thought if I ever discovered the identity of my charge, he thought I would make an exception. However, I _do not_ make exceptions to any of my ship's rules, and I do not like being tricked into anything.

Therefore, I wish to offer you a proposal; help me track down the bastards who tricked me, and give them a lesson they will _never_ forget, and in exchange, I will sail you directly to Arendelle, or Corona -as you had business there- and let myself and my crew leave you in peace."

Elsa considered the pirate's offer; it certainly was tempting, and she did want to know herself who had put her up to being captured, and for such a large reward amount, not to mention how said people knew the route she had been taking, which had been _strictly confidential._ She did not like the idea that someone had gotten through her security to get to her and had known the alias she had been using. _Whoever it is has gotten a hold of confidential information without being caught once, I would rather not risk it again by sending one of my own spymasters. Besides, this Captain Roberts has stolen several pieces of "confidential" cargo from ships under the Arendelle flag. It does irk me that it would require me to let a pirate go free, however I suppose what he is asking is quite fair, considering what he is offering to do._

Elsa took a deep breath before answering, "I find your terms… _mostly_ acceptable. I do believe with a few revisions, we can come to an agreement."

Roberts smiled (with surprisingly white teeth, for one living at sea) "well then, let's get started."

* * *

Elsa had to admit that _The Mourning Angel_ was really a beautiful ship; three large masts of sturdy wood rose from the deck, with white sails and sturdy ropes for the rigging. The whole deck of the ship was made of that same dark wood as the walls of the Captain's cabin. A row of cannons sat shiny well maintained at the sides of the deck, which smoothness was only interrupted by the occasional grate, and trapdoor into the lower decks. From what she had seen from her own ship, the sides of the frigate were painted red with white and gold trim, a metal battering ram attached to the prow, with the figurehead of a man with wings instead of arms outstretched on each side of the boat, which seemed to be looking down at the water with a look of utmost heartbreak. The top deck was surprisingly not very crowded with only the occasional sailor working on the ropes, wiping down the cannons, and even two sailors sitting down on the deck playing cards. Slowly the queen made her way to the side of the ship and looked at the expanse of water, the light of the moon flickering against the sea, enjoying the wind on her face after so long confined to that horrid cell and once again thanking her lucky stars that she did not get seasick.

It had taken a while to get the contract between herself and Captain Roberts to both of their likings. Elsa had insisted on better quarters for herself and Gerda, though Gerda would be confined to the room at all times (apparently something about some men getting ideas in their loneliness had given birth to the idea), although she would be allowed to wander. On the proviso that she was within sight of a senior member of the crew at all times, and stayed out of the way of the pirates. Elsa took another deep breath of the salty air, trying to calm down from a conversation they had had while working out the details on their agreement.

* * *

"_I'm just slightly confused is all," Roberts had said, "you willingly sacrificed yourself for your men, and yet they say that you do not care for the dead or living."_

_Elsa frowned, "of course I care for those under me, I would be a poor queen if I did not, and where on Earth did you hear that I did not care for the dead?"_

_Roberts looked up from the paper and seemed to be choosing his words carefully, "They say that you did not speak to your sister, when she was alive and that you cast her out, because she was the second born sister, 'just the spare' as they say. Such rumors were only given more grounding when word spread that you did not attend your parent's funeral and pay your respects."_

_Elsa felt her heart skip a beat and didn't even notice the ice starting to form from underneath her feet. The only thing had been aware of was the agony of old wounds and accusations. She slowly turned her head to the pirate captain and spoke slowly, her voice a mixture of ice and acid._

"_Those rumors are wrong on several points; one, everything I ever did was to protect my sister. Two, my sister was _never_ a spare, and anyone who calls her such will have to answer to me. Three; I couldn't go to the funeral…" her voice had trailed off to a slight mumble, "there was a snowstorm that lasted for a month that year. It may have been impossible to leave the castle, but I _did_ pay my respects."_

_He had looked at her and seen the pain in her eyes at the mention of her late sister. His eyes seemed to flicker to the back corner of the room for a moment, then he sighed._

"_I do not like putting too much faith in rumors, majesty, and I meant no disrespect, honestly, but still…" he had looked at her strangely, "it is good to hear you value those of your blood."_

* * *

Elsa gripped the railing on the ship at the memory. Even if the words were true, after all, she _had_ shut out her sister; she did _not_ like being accused of not loving her. She remembered the day she had heard of her sister's death well. Her parents had left on a journey for two weeks, and Anna, (who she had been told had returned from a boarding school abroad) was to go with them. Two weeks had turned into three, and then… that knock, so innocent at first, even if she heard a strange tremor in the butler Kai's voice. Elsa shuddered as she remembered the shock and then raw pain as Kai told her the news that her parents, her sister were never coming home. It had taken a week to calm down and even longer to stop the snowstorm that her agony had summoned to her kingdom. After everything, she had done to protect her sister by shutting her out (granted after that one day at her door when her sister had sounded so desperate, Anna had never interacted with her again, except for the occasional letter from school), it hadn't meant a thing. Anna still died, and even worse, she died believing that Elsa hadn't loved her.

Elsa heard a small caught come from her right and she looked over. An arm against the railing next to her was the quartermaster. She now saw that he was a little shorter than her, his dark green hooded coat was buttoned down, and had made him seem taller, as well as the high boots he wore, adding an extra inch or so to the man's height. The man's face was still hidden behind his hood, but she could see he looked somewhat nervous.

"Hello," Elsa said politely, glancing at the sailor. The man seemed to jump slightly and then pointed to himself.

"H-hi me?" he asked sounding strangely incredulous. When she nodded, he glanced at her again, "oh, uh… hi, your majesty."

Elsa suppressed an eye roll at the pirate's awkwardness. He may have been a pirate, but his nervousness helped remind her that he was still human, and not some bloodthirsty boogey man that many children often saw when they heard the word 'pirate', though it contrasted greatly when she had seen him holding a blade against her captain's throat. The pirate stared at the sea for a moment, before he seemed to jump slightly.

"Here," He said reaching into his coat and pulling out a strange semi-flat box, somewhat large, and wrapped in brown paper. She eyed the pirate and package suspiciously. "It's a peace offering," the quartermaster continued, "been saving it for a special occasion."

She glared pointedly at the pirate, and spoke regally, though tried not to sound too harsh, "after killing several members of my ship's crew, and taking me hostage, even if you didn't know I was queen, you think that whatever is in that box will change my opinion of you and your chosen lifestyle?"

The quartermaster seemed to open his mouth to argue, but after a moment, he wilted, and glanced at the box with what she could swear was forlorn expression.

"I know that I have done a lot of things I'm not proud of," the quartermaster said, his voice low, "but I'm not a monster, no matter what you may think. I have killed yes, but you know I speak truthfully when I say your men would not have spared me if I had not struck first. I am sorry I had to though; loyal soldiers are hard to come by these days. I have seen many a bodyguard willing to betray his charge for a bit of coin, but yours did not blink when faced with bad odds."

"And yet that does not stop you from pillaging the innocent, and taking hostages of people you do not know for sport." She countered. He looked slightly indignant at that but before he could argue, she continued, "If you do not enjoy such things, then why do you insist on breaking the law so blatantly, why do you hurt instead of help by doing honest work?"

The quartermaster paused for a moment, as if considering his words. Elsa knew she wasn't acting dignified at the moment, but the conversation about her sister had thrown her off kilter. She turned to look at the man, as he once again spoke, "at first it was for the adventure. When I was young, I was not allowed to leave the walls of my home. I suppose you could say I was a noble of sorts, but then I had a… shall we say, 'falling out' with my parents over my elder sibling, and they cast me out. At the time, Captain Roberts was my only friend, and the only person who treated me like a living being worth glancing at, and after the fight, he made it clear he didn't think any less of me. Then it was out of loyalty, because even without a coin to my name, actually no name at all, he still accepted me for who I was. Yes, our endeavors may not have been legal, but he has never given me a reason to regret my decision. We may be pirates, but we look after our own. The ship is our home, its crew our family, we have to work together, trust each other in order to keep it afloat and thriving. To tell you the truth your majesty, I have never been given a reason to regret my decision to stay; company is nice, the coin decent, and I have gotten to see things and places you could never even dream of. All in all, I think while it was not a perfect solution, given my circumstances, it was the best."

Elsa thought about his words for a long time and then spoke, her voice calm, "I accept that circumstances force the hand of many to turn against the law, but that does not forgive all sins. You and your crew may help yourselves, but you make the people who genuinely work hard and earn their keep, it makes those people struggle, leads them to similar situations as your crew - such as poverty, and makes peace and stability very difficult. Surely you see while your crew may believe your actions to be justified, they are still detrimental."

The quartermaster bowed his head and nodded, and spoke again, "though your words are true, and I respect them, I wouldn't repeat them to the other crewmembers. They don't like royalty, and saying stuff like that would only make a fight break out, or worse."

The queen nodded stiffly, and turned away from the quartermaster, when he suddenly stopped her. She whipped around glaring at the man, but she hesitated when she briefly saw his dark blue eyes filled with an emotion she could not place.

"Did you love her?" he asked quietly, his voice filled with hope… or pain? Elsa frowned at the pirate, and he slowly clarified, "Your sister, did you love her? Did you really think she wasn't worthless, despite what everyone else thinks?"

If possible, Elsa stiffened even more, and stared at the pirate doing her best to hide her fury. _How dare him! How dare him, after everything I sacrificed for her, to protect her!? _Elsa instead forced her face to remain calm, though she could not keep the ice from her voice, "She was my sister, and she was the kindest, smartest, most loving person I ever knew. I may not have gotten to see her often, but _that_ I know. I honestly hope I never meet the person who started that foolish rumor of my sister being 'just a _spare'_ because if I ever personally meet them, they would receive a fate that would make them wish for a permanent stay in the castle dungeons!"

Elsa stormed off, her fists clenched in anger, and her heart clenched in regret. _Why?_ She thought in agony, _why do I have to defend her now when it is too late? Why could I have not controlled my curse so that I could defend her sooner, when it mattered? Oh, Anna, why did you have to die, and leave me alone?_

* * *

**Author's Note: After several weeks of terrible internet, finals, and massive writers block, I have realized that this story is not exactly the romance thing I had planned isn't really going to fit into the main plot of this fic. So I've decided to just go and write what feels right and if the romance fits in later then I'll add it. Sorry for the wait but inspiration waits until crazy hours to strike. Thanks for sticking with me and remember that comments, favorites and reviews really make my day, so if you could leave any of them I would very much appreciate it.**

**Happy Holidays!**


	6. Chapter 5: Incidents and Accidents

**Warning: there is an incident of attempted rape in this chapter (I made it as non graphic as I could though)**

**Author's note: I apologize to everyone for any errors, as I beta my own stuff.**

**FYI: I do not own Frozen**

Chapter 5

_Present day_

Even though Elsa's distant behavior didn't change from when they were little, knowing that her sister loved her without a doubt lifted a great weight that had been on her shoulders for many years. Her sister continued to avoid her, though interestingly enough, being shut out now was better than before, because now she at least knew _why_ her sister wasn't talking to her. Because of Roberts' questioning her sister at the dinner (at Anna's request) several days before, and then her sister's answer after Anna asked her directly, she now knew that Elsa hadn't hated her, though she still wasn't sure whether it was out of love or guilt. _Or maybe both,_ a part of Anna's mind suggested, but she shook herself, and readjusted her hood, making sure her face was hidden from sight.

Not revealing her identity had been one of the hardest decisions she had ever made, but after, a long argument with Chatterbox, Kay, and Roberts, they all agreed that it would be best for Anna's identity would be best hidden. Not only did they not know how much Elsa had changed all these years, but since Anna had been shut out (even _if_ for a _so-called_ good reason), they didn't know whether or not she would trust them if she knew. The only thing both Anna and Roberts had insisted on, was that Elsa was to be watched by one of them at all times.

It wasn't that they didn't trust her enough to leave her alone (they knew Elsa needed their help, and she already knew an escape attempt would be futile) but the fact they were on a ship. A ship full of men, some teens, and some mid thirties, who all had some semblance of hormones, and lacked the inclination, and will to ignore them (and even if they did, they all had to admit the queen was good looking enough for several of the men to ignore morals). The only other thing that really had put a damper on her hopeful optimism was the fact the queen continued to be stubborn and refuse Anna's truce gift.

Anna was pulled out of her thoughts when she heard Scar unmistakable howl. Looking around she found the yell was coming from the medical bay. _Wiz must be relocating Scar's arm_ she thought with a guilty smile. Scar had been unfortunate enough to be the one to find Gerda, when they had first taken Elsa's ship. Apparently she had given the brute of a man a run for his money when he tried to take her hostage, by both trying to hit him with a metal hairbrush, and giving him an earful. Anna had felt bad for him, being on the receiving end of Gerda's riot act several times when she was younger (mostly from her various escapades against _the door)._ Anna walked into the room, seeing the giant massaging his arm.

"Wow, when I heard that old maid had dislocated your arm with a pot, it was hard to believe," Anna said shaking her head at the poor guy, "what made her take a swing at you?"

"I opened the door to tell _Lady Tollak_ that the captain wanted to see her, and apparently said lady was… busy," judging by Scar's blush, Elsa must have been dressing at the time.

"I swear," said Wiz, his eyes avoiding Anna, "women are a species all their own." Scar nodded vehemently in agreement, busy massaging his shoulder.

Anna merely grinned and rolled her eyes, "you said it, just give me a stiff drink, an' some nice plunder an' I'm good."

The two of them laughed and scar left the room, with a quick thanks to Wiz. Wiz was halfway between a mad scientist and a doctor. He had wiry salt and pepper hair that reminded Anna of her bed head, with all of its crazy angles. He was stick thin, and very pale, and had light brown eyes that seem to spark. For being the shortest person on the boat (shorter than even Anna) he was a genius, able to make almost anything out of anything, such as makeshift ammunition, or even a replacement sextant once. He was also a skilled doctor, having saved several crewmembers lives, Anna's included a few times, although sometimes his medical skills had been needed for… interrogations.

"Stiff drink huh?" Wiz said, he sounded exited (but then again he always did), "I got a bottle of Schnapps, if yer interested."

Anna shrugged and pulled out flask and held it out to him. He took out his own and carefully poured some into each. They raised their metal flasks and Anna drank deeply.

"Not tha' I'm complainin'," she started frowning, "but what's the occasion?"

"Nothin," Wiz shrugged, "it's jus' tha' I'll be able to get anotha' bottle when we reach Corona."

Anna nodded and took another swig. Alcohol had been something she had long gotten used to being on a pirate ship, as occasionally, rum was the only drink available. She didn't like drinking for a number of reasons, but sometimes it couldn't be avoided, or she was with someone she trusted.

"So, did ya hear anything interestin' from those mercs?" Asked Anna, thinking about the men on Elsa's ship, "Like why there were so many? I mean, we kicked their butts, but that was still a lotta guards."

"The ones who's tongues I loosened, didn't know any more than us. Tha' they was transporting a Lady Genova from House Tollak to Corona for sommat to do with politics. The rest they either didn't know or weren't tellin, and I doubt the latter." He took another swig, and Anna saw his eyes spark more than normal.

"And?" Anna prompted, and Wiz grinned, which she found strangely disturbing.

"When the boardin' party searched the ship they found sommat intrestin'. The room with the good Lady, was all frost'd over. As in _ice_."

Anna nearly choked on her drink, and looked at Wiz with a hard gaze, "you do realize that one of Arendelle's main exports _is _ice, righ'?"

Wiz watched her carefully before shrugging, "aye, but why-"

The door burst open, revealing Smoke with a frantic look on his face.

"What did you do!?" Anna demanded furiously, and Smoke shrank under her gaze.

"I uh, lost her." He admitted breathlessly. All color drained out of Anna's face and grabbed Smoke's collar, "_What do you mean you lost her_!?" Anna roared, panic and adrenaline exploding through her.

"She was on the gunner deck, and I look away for three seconds, and when I look back she's gone, honest!" Smoke yelped, his face too going white. Anna dropped him and sprinted for the Gunner deck.

_Nonononononono! If those bastards lay one finger on my sister, they'll have hell to pay!_ Anna skidded to a halt when she reached the gunner deck and looked around wildly. Taking a few deep breaths to calm down, she carefully surveyed the area. _Smoke said she was by the mid port cannons so… _she looked around and saw a small thread stuck on a loose nail. Anna grabbed it and felt it. _Silk_ she realized, and looked around, fearing the worst checked the door that led to the crew's quarters, and to her horror she saw a single platinum blonde hair. She yanked the door open and sprinted through the ship, yanking some throwing knives out of her sleeves. One of the men was standing outside the door, and his eyes widened at the charging Quartermaster. Immediately he made a move to cover the door, but Anna grabbed him by the neck and growled, "is she in there!?"

The man made a move to shake his head, but Anna suddenly heard the sound of a scream from the other side of the door. A _woman's_ scream. Anna punched the crewmember in the nose, and crashed through the door. And promptly froze in horror. One look at her sister, being held down on one of the sleeping mats was all it took for Anna to lose it. She let her knives fly, and charged into the room, the only thing running though her head that these idiots would _pay dearly_.

Having been a pirate, she had had her share of tavern brawls, and thanks to Gawain, and Kaleb, she knew a fair amount of unarmed combat. As one of her crewmen made a swing at her she ducked and slammed her knee into his groin, and turned, slamming an uppercut into another. She continued ducking and dodging, not going for many hits, but when she did she made sure to connect, and made sure they _hurt._ She suddenly saw the crewman that had been standing over Elsa stand, yank out the knife lodged in his arm, and sneered, "if you wanted some you coulda' ask'd."

Anna slammed her fist toward him, but he moved and went for his pistol. He never made it. Anna's throwing knife sailed through the air faster than the eye could follow, lodging itself in the man's chest. He sank to his knees and she heard him mutter, "She's loot, and the code says to share loot…"

Anna activated her hidden wrist blade and slammed it into the man's throat and continued panting, slowly coming back to her senses. There were six unconscious bodies on the ground. Six. She was pulled out of her haze by a small whimper. Anna turned and saw Elsa curled into the fetal position on the floor. Anna felt her heart drop, and slowly, went over to her sister.

"Shhhh," Anna murmured ignoring how uncomfortable it was kneeling on the cold floor, and careful not to get too close to Elsa, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sosososo sorry." Anna whispered, scared that her voice would crack. Unsure of what else to do, she slowly started humming, slowly reaching over to her sister, as unthreatening as possible.

Elsa did not move as Anna gently lifted her up. Nor did she move as Anna carried her to her quarters. She carefully, laid Elsa down on her bed and walked over to her trunk to get her medical supplies. Anna grabbed her medical bag and set it on her bookshelf. She pulled out a roll of bandage and turned to look at her sister.

Anna blinked when she saw Elsa staring at her, and gulped. Elsa was watching her with an unreadable expression on her face.

Anna sighed and sank down on the chair across from the bed, sinking her head into her shoulders. "I'm so sorry," Anna murmured quietly, and slowly put the roll down.

The monarch stared at Anna some more, and Anna waited, a feeling of dread curling up inside of her. Then Elsa spoke, "I know that song."

Anna blinked. She hadn't realized she'd started humming again. Her blood ran cold when she realized that she had been humming the tune to the song she always sang when asking her sister to come out to play. Truthfully while a part of her was terrified that Elsa would remember where the song was from, a part of her leapt with joy that Elsa had actually been listening all of those times she had sung it.

Anna paused for a moment, gathering her thoughts, before deciding to try a different approach. Anna braced herself, making her voice sound more masculine before meekly asking, "Could you please make sure that maid of yours doesn't kill me?"

Elsa's lips flickered upwards for a moment, but became stoic again before she nodded.

"Um… did they... was I…?" Anna finally asked quietly, though terrified of the answer.

Elsa slowly shook her head, "you came in before they…" her voice trailed off.

Anna thought for a moment before asking, "Are you hurt?"

Slowly Elsa shook her head, "my wrist. And my pride I suppose; it was stupid of me to think that being nobility makes me immune to consequences, and for thinking that the reason you always have me watched is because you think I'll swim off or something."

Anna slowly reached for her sister's wrist, before stopping and looking to see if it was okay. Elsa seemed to pause, and then slowly nodded. As gently as she could Anna picked up her sister's wrist. Anna's eyes hardened, _damn_, _those bastards dislocated it._

"I need to realign it," Anna said apologetically. Elsa's eyes widened for a moment, before she screwed her eyes shut and nodded. Elsa cried out when her joint was snapped back into place. "Sorry." Anna whispered, not wanting to cause her sister pain.

Anna glanced around the room again, trying to remember where she had put the bandage roll, when her eyes came across a familiar box. She carefully finished wrapping her sister's wrist before taking the box and slowly handing it to Elsa.

"I uh, heard that you were stuck in your room for a while, so it makes sense that you would not know everything about social interactions, less of which to do with pirates. So… Truce?" asked Anna ignoring how childish she sounded.

Her sister frowned at the box, seemingly having an internal debate of sorts, before slowly reaching out and taking it. She opened it and stared stunned, and looked at Anna incredulously.

"Chocolate?" she asked, sounding confused.

"Only evil people don't like chocolate," Anna mumbled, again ignoring the fact that she sounded childish.

Elsa looked at Anna for a moment, and then cautiously smiled, "I accept your truce good sir, to show I bear you no ill will, and as thanks for saving me from my own folly."

Anna shuffled her feet, "thanks. I'm glad your okay-"

She was interrupted by Gerda, Chatterbox, and Roberts, all of them with looks of alarm on their faces, which was explained by an embarrassed Smoke trailing after them. The maid took one look at the queen and Anna before she grabbed a candlestick and charged at the Quartermaster. Anna let out a small yelp and fell over her chair in a desperate attempt to get away; thanking her lucky stars her hood didn't come off.

"GERDA," Elsa said her voice loud and stern, "Mr. Andrews had nothing to do with my current state. In fact if not for his intervention I would be… much worse."

The maid stopped short, and looking rather embarrassed, and gently put the candlestick down, then rushing to take care of her charge. Anna scrambled to her feet, careful to keep her hood on, and looked at Roberts.

"The bastards are in the hold," she grunted scowling.

Roberts looked at Anna slowly, "In one piece?"

"No promises,"

Roberts nodded and Smoke left the room to deal with the insubordinates. He eyed the box of chocolates and raised his eyebrow.

"I have a question," Roberts frowned at her, before Chatterbox said, "As do I, but you first captain."

"Isn't that the box of chocolates that you had to haggle from several of the other crewmembers for, including me? That particular ship had been traveling to the Southern Isles from Belgium I recall, and had been a rumored co-op of the best chocolate makers from both Belgium and Switzerland, 'the best chocolate makers _ever_' as you put it, and is supposed to have samples of different types of chocolate from both countries, of the finest quality?" Roberts asked with his eyebrows raised.

"I was hoping we could share," Anna pouted quietly, working hard to maintain her deep timbre.

"Sense when do you share _chocolate_?" asked Chatterbox, his eyebrows raised, with a smile on his lips.

"Uhhh…"

Without another word, Roberts and Chatterbox burst out laughing, leaving Anna thankful her hood (partially) hid her blush. It took another moment for her to realize Elsa had a hand over her mouth, and was hiding a laugh of her own.


	7. Chapter 6: Action and Consequences

**FYI: I do not own anything! All rights go to their respective owners.**

**Also, see bottom for author's note.**

* * *

Chapter 6

_Six and a half years ago_

"Sir," came a shout from the port side of the ship, "I think you'll want to see this."

Gawain pulled out his spyglass and pointed it where the lookout was pointing. He nearly dropped his spyglass when he saw the ship in question. _Never thought I'd see one of those again _he thought dryly. Smarts came from behind him and gave it a once over with his own spyglass.

"The colors are of the Southern Isles, so this is definitely the ship Rascal told us about not really sure if it's important," Smarts frowned through the spyglass.

Andrews, looking through her own spyglass, was glaring at the ship, "important? Look at the size of that thing! What kind of ship is that anyway?!"

"Man O' War," said Gawain quietly, "three cannon levels that pack one hell of a punch. It's slower than a barnacle though, so we could out maneuver it, but we would have to stay behind it; the back is the only place without cannons, and even one volley from that ship would take a serious chunk out of _The Mourning Angel_."

Andrews nodded, "judging by the size, it's probably carrying some serious cargo."

Gawain nodded put away his spyglass, "so, who wants to sink a Man O' War?"

Andrews grinned, "as long as we get to board it; I need something to punch."

Smoke let out a crazy grin and began running toward the lower decks, "I'll go check on the powder monkeys, just say when you're ready to start this!"

"Mr. Andrews," Gawain called getting behind the wheel, "prepare for battle!"

"Aye Captain," Andrews called back cheerfully, "All hands, loose tops, gallons and royals! Give it all she's got; every scrap on the wind! Everyone else stand ready at the port cannons and mortars!"

The crew scrambled to lower the sails as the powder monkeys began to prep the cannons for battle. The white sails lowered and _The Mourning Angel_ lurched forward as the ship began to pick up speed. Gawain gripped the wheel, and steered his ship toward the massive warship, occasionally course correcting when the waves tried to push _The Mourning Angel _in one direction or another with the tide.

Gawain could see several of his men pulling on the rigging, rapidly adjusting the cloth to catch the wind. Even the two sailors who often played cards by the cannons had stood up to ready the cannons, oiling and loading them, preparing for the fight ahead. Andrews called orders out, often jumping in to help if something was taking too long. Occasionally, the wind would blow Andrews hood off, revealing the knit cap that she used to keep her twin braids hidden, only to be quickly put on again hiding her face.

_The Mourning Angel_ was now in cannonball range, though Gawain hoped to get closer to their prey. The Man O' War was massive; a dark brown with golden trim, with what looked like a wooden serpent at the head of the ship. The Man O' War, which Gawain could now see was called _The Llewdor_, had blue sails with golden flowers emblazoned in the middle and were unfurled to the utmost. The crew members of the ship, from what he could see from his spyglass, were mercenaries of some kind.

"Steady on those cannons, and aim for the lower and far aft of the ship!" Andrews yelled as she took her place beside the wheel, where Gawain was steering.

The cannons were pushed into position and the crew seemed to buzz with anticipation. _The Mourning Angel_ was now behind _The Llewdor_, and Gawain gave a quick nod and muttered, "Show time."

"Fire port cannons! And hoist the Jolly Roger!" Andrews cried, and was quickly rewarded with the deafening sound of cheers from the men, and the deafening booms of the cannons.

Smoke quickly filled the air, but did little to deter the pirates as they scurried to reload the cannons. The remaining crew was raising the flag, and from what Gawain could see, causing the crew aboard _The Llewdor_ to spring into action. The Man O' War immediately tried to turn, attempting to put _The Mourning Angel _in its firing range, but Gawain concentrated on steering her out of the Man O' Wars range while keeping it in _The Mourning Angel'_s.

Andrews had entered her element. Waiting for the right time to strike, and then yelling for the men fire either the port or starboard cannons whenever they were steered in firing range. Smoke on the other hand was… well, having a blast; running from cannon to cannon, and sometimes to the mortars, checking everything before peering through his spyglass to look at the enemy ship.

"Oohh, Oooh!" Smoke cried excitedly, "aim for right there with the mortars, it should help cripple them sir!"

"Aim mortars where Mr. Smoke indicates! Starboard cannons….. Fire!" Shouted Andrews in reply, and was quickly answered with the deafening boom of the cannons firing, and the blast of the mortars hitting the weakening aft of the Man O' War.

_The Llewdor_ was quickly going in shambles. The ship's stern had quickly been reduced to splinters, thanks to Andrews, and the rest of the ship was slowly following. The helmsman on board was trying desperately to steer the ship into a position to hit _The Mourning Angel_ but the damaged rudder, and already slow speed of the Man O' War was making that impossible. The hull of the ship was slowly being torn to shreds and the men in the crow's nest were quickly making work of _The Llewdor_'s powder supply, using their larger rifles to blast the barrels to bits, and sometimes taking a chunk of the enemy crew with them.

The waterlogged game of cat and mouse continued on for several minutes, as Andrews and Smoke made every shot count, and Gawain kept _The Mourning Angel_ out of danger, until, finally there was a creak and a groan from the larger ship and several of the masts snapped off and fell to the water, taking rigging, and several seamen with them.

"She's flounderin'!" yelled Smoke gleefully, and Gawain let out a relieved grin, and steered the ship beside the Llewdor.

"Ready the grappling hooks and prepare to board!" Andrews shouted as _The Mourning Angel _pulled alongside what was left of the massive ship.

The crew scrambled to grab the hooks, threw them at _The Llewdor_, and began to shimmy up the ropes aboard the enemy ship. Gawain smiled when he saw Andrews run and swing on a rope, grabbing on a cannon before hauling herself on board the ship. Gawain himself rushed to the rigging, grabbed a hook, and with a well placed kick, the hook shot upward and he landed on the lower mast platform with a thud. Grabbing a nearby musket, Gawain began to help his boarding party from afar.

From what he could see several of his men were scattered across the deck of the behemoth ship, from upper decks, to on top of the life boats. Kay was slashing his sword, and Andrews was both dancing with her blade, and punching sailors that got too close to her. The captain of the ship was beside the wheel, fighting with two of his men, and winning by the looks of it, at least until Gawain downed the man with a well placed musket shot. Gawain turned and saw Andrews climbing up the rigging of the enemy ship, before coming upon the top of the tallest mast. With a well placed swipe of her sword the flag of the Man O' War fluttered down to the drink, and the last of the enemy crew surrendered. Gawain smiled shaking his head, _why they put so much faith in a swatch of cloth I'll never know. Oh well, show time!_

He reached forward and grabbed a rope and swung aboard the Man O' War. Gawain had quickly learned that when it came to taking a ship, it was better to be more frightening than understanding. Their first attempt to rob a ship, (the Southern Isles convoy Rascal had mentioned) had gone fine up until the enemy crew surrendered. He had attempted to charm them, however, he had quickly learned that anything short of threatening a fate worse than death was seen as weakness. That had been a bad day, even if they had managed to salvage the situation. Pointing the emptied convoy ships in the direction of the most prominent naval capitals _had_ sent a powerful message, though he had been sorry it had come to that.

The crew of _The Llewdor_ were on their knees staring worriedly at the pirates that now surrounded them. They looked a little confused, since their captain was dead, and many of them were appeared afraid that the pirates' wrath would turn on them, now that there was no captain to take the brunt of the savagery.

"Let me make this clear," Said Roberts coldly, _remember, add the smirk and the eye glint, but not at the same time,_ "my crew will take everything aboard this ship that isn't strapped down, and all of you will stay as still as a sandbar while we do it. Anyone who doesn't…" _add the eye glint,_ "get's to choose whether or not they want to lose their fingers, or toes." _And queue the smirk._

The men stiffened, but not one of them made a move to go anywhere, even as the crates of food and rum were pulled out of the hull, Until a boy was taken out of the hold.

"Who are you?" asked Gawain frowning, and the boy grinned.

"Name's Wizard, but evry'one calls me Wiz," he said, sounding as though he was ecstatic, "Thanks a bunch for getting me out of that stuffy cell. I hate having to make stuff for these buffoons, they don't even pay me! Hey, your that pirate Roberts, I'll tell ya what; you let me be on your crew, and I'll be your ships doctor, weapon maker, interrogator, whatever ya need I'll do it! With payment and stuff though."

Gawain smiled at Wizard's enthusiasm, "Pledge yourself to the crew and sign the contract, and your set. But tell me one thing first; what were you doing on that ship?"

Wizard grimaced, "I was making weapons. Experimental stuff mostly. Oh, ya know I've got a design for smoke bombs! Those'll prob'ly come in real handy for ya righ'?"

Gawain nodded, and then turned to the enemy crew, "Anyone else want to join… No? Then don't move, and my crew probably won't kill you."

Satisfied that they weren't going anywhere Gawain went over to the captain's cabin to see if there was anything interesting. When he entered he spotted Andrews already inside, sorting through several boring looking chests. Gawain looked around for a moment and saw that she had already set aside several official looking letters, some maps, gemstones, small statuettes, and even a tortoise shell hair comb. He went over to the Captain's desk and began to rifle through it. It had mostly sailing instruments, which were always sellable, there were even a couple of newer looking maps scattered haphazardly on the desk, he slowly took them to look them over, knowing maps were always useful…

He was interrupted by a choking noise behind him. Gawain whipped around hand on a pistol to find Andrews staring at a scroll. The Scroll appeared to have come out of a polished wooden box with the Arendelle Crocus emblazoned on it, _which means it must be a royal declaration of sorts _Gawain surmised. He was brought out of his thoughts by another choke, and then it hit Gawain that Andrews was crying. Quickly he went over to his quartermaster and looked over her shoulder at the document she was now holding with trembling hands. He quickly skimmed over the first few paragraphs before he stopped and did a double take. His eyes narrowed and he reached around Anna and adjusted the scroll so he could see it better. _Oh gods, _Gawain's mind spinning with the implications, _why? It makes no sense! Why?!_

Gawain sighed softly and held Anna in a hug as she cried. He continued to comfort his friend until they heard a knock at the cabin door. Anna nodded, and they picked up the loot inside and left, and Gawain saw her take the scroll and it's box and take it with her.

* * *

"Let me get this straight," Said Pike slowly, "The King and Queen of Arendelle just erased Anna from the face of the world? Can they do that?"

"They're King and Queen Pike," Anna nodded numbly, "yes they can do that sort of thing. Normally it's just someone getting stripped of their titles and status, but it's not unheard of for people to be erased from the records all together."

"I think what he means is can they do that to a member of the royal family?" Kay elaborated, and Pike nodded.

Anna just seemed to sink in her chair and Chatterbox's voice though soft was heard loud and clear; "apparently so, seeing as it's just happened. I am sorry about this Anna."

She just nodded, and then glared angrily at the scroll, "Why? I mean I know I wasn't the best princess ever, and I know Elsa did way better at her lessons than me, but why throw me out altogether? I mean I thought it was weird that there were no 'Missing Princess' posters everywhere but this? I mean they were _looking_ for me, right?" her voice trailed off.

"I did think the lack of wanted posters was fairly odd," Smoke admitted thoughtfully, "but how could any of us think that that meant this would happen? I mean really, this is worst case scenario. I mean erasing you from the records and making it illegal for people to admit you were born, I mean how insane is that-"

"Smoke," Kay rumbled, "shut up."

"So," Smoke began slowly, "what now?"

The boys and girl looked at each other. They did not have an answer to that question. Then Gawain got up and took a box from underneath an oilcloth. "Happy Birthday, Anna."

She looked at him strangely, before cautiously taking the box and opening it. Anna gasped when she removed two retractable wrist blades.

"Where did you get these?" She breathed staring at the blades with a look of shock.

"Remember that Mayan Keystone we found?" Anna nodded affirmative to Gawain's question, "well," he continued, "Kenway apparently collects them, and he recently got a hold of a spot called Great Inagua that the previous owner apparently kept a collection of those."

Anna released a watery smile, and whispered her thanks to him, before attaching the wrist blades to her greaves, before pulling her coat's sleeve over the new accessory. She activated the blade experimentally and smiled when the blade sprang forward at a moment's notice.

"The shipping manifest aboard the ship stated that this ship was supposed to go to the southern isles to deliver a large sum of money to the royal treasury to the Southern Isles," Chatterbox mentioned softly, "it was supposed to be checked in personally by one of the princes, Hans, before delivery to the castle vaults."

"Where did the money originate from?" Asked Gawain cautiously and Chatterbox glanced at a paper.

"It originated from Weaseltown," he said after a moment, "apparently it's supposed to be a loan of some kind."

Gawain shrugged and then grinned, "Not anymore."

* * *

**BatteriezNotIncluded here. I recently got hit by inspirational lightning (figuratively speaking), so I have a few chapters pre done. I am also having issues with my internet, so I will try to upload as much as I can. If you want chapters sooner, then please Review, Favorite, and Follow, and I will walk to the coffee shop that's about a mile and a half from my house, and use their internet to upload the chapters.**

**Thank you for your patience, you guys are awesome. Virtual chocolate for all of you!**


	8. Chapter 7: Questions and Answers

**BatteriezNotIncluded here, this is pretty much an exposition chapter. And of course as usual I do not own Anything, all rights belong to Disney.**

**Please remember to Favorite, Follow, and/or Review if you want the next chapter to come out sooner.**

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Chapter 7

_Present Day_

Corona was beautiful, as always and Anna had to admit she had missed the small island nation. With the recent return of their lost princess, Corona was more plentiful than ever before, and that included the Corona Mail company. Anna opened the door to the warehouse, and surreptitiously checked to make sure her hood was on securely as she entered the old building. The sounds of shouting and rustling of papers filled her ears as she walked through the mail house. A sudden cry jolted her out of her gawking; she looked toward the origin of the yell and saw a grinning Rascal running toward her.

"Hiya Mr. Andrews," he grinned, then lowered his voice, "Roberts keepin' a low profile again?"

Anna nodded and deepened her voice, "yeah, old Crabbers thought it would be fun to give us a wild goose chase of a contract."

"Crabbers, huh?" Rascal muttered, tapping his chin thoughtfully, "we got a letter to him a while ago, from some Weselton guy."

"You wouldn't by any chance have a copy would you?" She asked, and Rascal smiled, "Nope, but I can give you the original; we sent _him_ the copy."

He beckoned her to follow him, and he led her through the warehouse to a back room. Looking around, he quickly dialed in a code and stepping inside, gesturing for her to follow. The room was small, and had a single desk that was filled with several strange dials and papers, which Anna assumed were for code breaking. Rascal grinned and pulled out an envelope with an official looking wax seal. Rascal handed her a candle and she quickly used it to soften the wax, and open the letter without breaking the seal. She quickly skimmed through the note and grimaced. _Jerk,_ Anna thought bitterly as she pocketed the letter and turned to thank Rascal, only to find him rummaging through the desk.

"I also found this," he said triumphantly and pulled out a second letter, this one also from Weselton, "It had a pretty nice cipher, but not good enough and I know Roberts like to collect stuff that could be used for blackmail." He boasted proudly and handed Anna the translation. Anna read through the letter, and nearly dropped it. _I knew they were up to something but I didn't realize…_ her thoughts trailed off, as dread began to pool into her stomach.

She handed Rascal a bag of coins and mumbled a thank you and goodbye, before racing back to _The Mourning Angel _as fast as she could.

* * *

"He set me up!" Gawain cried, voice laced with fury, "He knew you were the Queen! Just as he knew I wouldn't have anything to do with it if I knew it was you! I am going to _kill_ Crabbers!"

"Ranting about it here isn't going to solve anything," Chatterbox pointed out, "At least now we know that the Duck contacted him directly telling him to make sure it was us doing the kidnapping, so now at least we know it wasn't some misunderstanding."

"Your Bosun has a point," Elsa agreed, "Someone wanted you to take the blame for my apparent kidnapping and ransom, though this letter does not state to what end, and then there is the fact that they knew I was the Queen in the first place."

"The only thing we know for certain now, is that the kidnapping contract was ordered by Weselton, and-"

"Weselton?" Elsa asked surprised, "Are you sure? They are Arendelle's closest partner in trade; I see no possible explanation of how ordering such a contract would be beneficial to them."

"You'd be surprised," Anna muttered under her breath, and Elsa looked at her quizzically, "according to several correspondences our contact intercepted, the old Duck has been trying to unlock the secret as to why the gates of Arendelle have been closed for so long. The most popular theory is that you have some kind of secret treasure hidden inside your castle that you don't want anyone to know about."

Elsa's arms surreptitiously curled around her chest, "that's ridiculous! Arendelle is a peaceful Kingdom; we haven't had a war in centuries and we - I – have no plans to change that."

"Yeah well, the Duke and the other Kingdom's don't know that," Anna said pointedly, "and you have to admit, it would seem pretty suspicious; a completely peaceful Kingdom suddenly shuts it's gates to everyone and everything, with nobody having any clue as to why…"

Elsa (who now appeared _very_ uncomfortable) looked as if she wanted to say something, but Gawain held up his hand, "enough, both of you! We got what we wanted, so, Mr. Andrews, please inform the crew we are departing for Weasel Town. Hopefully we'll get our answers there."

Anna nodded, and left the cabin; slowly followed by the rest of them, save for the captain himself.

"Hey lads," She called to the seamen, "unfurl the sails; it would appear that Weasel Town is about to have hell to pay!"

The crew let out a cheer, and jumped to work. Anna sighed and, began to wander around the Deck making sure no one was having trouble. Tightening ropes, and adjusting rigging when necessary, she made sure the ship would be running smoothly. Once that was done, she quickly went below decks and into her quarters before anyone could stop her.

Once making sure the door to her quarters was closed, Anna took off her hood and hat, allowing her two braided pigtails to rest on her shoulders. Then, she knelt in front of the old trunk by her doorway, and opened it. Inside, at the top, was the medical kit she had insisted on keeping in her quarters (as she knew she was more accident prone than most on board the ship). She took it out and set it on the cot, and looked at the objects inside.

The trunk was filled with all of her keepsakes from Arendelle, all of them wrapped in individual oilcloths to keep the objects inside safe from the damp and mold from the moisture of the ship. She slowly took the top bundle and carefully unrolled it, and her smile turned wistful. Inside were two dolls, _the_ two dolls, made to look like she and her sister. Looking at the carefully preserved toys reminded her of the times of when she and her sister were younger, stealing chocolate from the kitchens, and playing in the snow…

Anna carefully wrapped the two dolls back in the oilcloth to keep them from getting damaged as she removed another bundle. This one was a small jewelry box which held the snowflake necklace Elsa had gotten for her all those years before, before being separated by _the_ _door _(even though she hadn't seen the inside of the Arendelle palace in years, she _still_ hated that damn thing). Anna continued carefully unwrapping and rewrapping the various miscellaneous objects, until at the very bottom, she found a hardwood box. The wood was such that it didn't need a cloth to keep its contents safe. Anna glared at the small box, for inside of it was that scroll; the one that had officially left her with no family to return to.

One of the things Roberts had first said to her was that pirates could retire whenever they wanted; it was just that most of them waited until they were so rich they had more money than what they could spend. He had also told Anna that day that if there ever came a time that she wanted to return home to the palace, return to her family, he would sail her there, no questions asked and no hard feelings. At the time she had been grateful for that, but hadn't thought she would ever take him up on it; being a pirate was so much better than being cooped up in a castle, with a sister that at the time she had thought wanted nothing to do with her. Then she had found that box and scroll, and realized that she no longer had that option.

Anna carefully put the objects back into the trunk, but put the box with the scroll near the top of the trunk for easy access. She still had yet to confirm or deny whether Elsa had had anything to do with her, as the twins liked to call it, 'ultimate banishment'. Though it didn't hold Elsa's signature, Anna knew that that did not mean that Elsa automatically had nothing to do with it. But she also held firm that Elsa would _never_ have agreed to such a thing. They had been so close when they were little, and Anna knew that those years had to mean something to her older sister, even if as nothing more than a distant memory…

Anna shook herself; there was no use if thinking about that now. What had been done was done, and there was nothing Anna could do about it. Suddenly feeling a bit claustrophobic, Anna carefully locked the trunk and went up to the top of the deck to stand at her favorite part of the ship: the prow of the ship looking down at the figurehead. Suddenly, a tap on her shoulder alerted her of another presence, and she turned to find Elsa looking at her.

"Hey, Your Majesty," Anna grinned, and gave her a nod in greeting, "what's up?"

Elsa spoke her tone one of curiosity, "If I may, what's the story behind this crew and Weselton? You don't seem to like them very much."

"Oh," Anna frowned slightly, "several years ago, Weselton did a sweep of all of the people who didn't or couldn't pay their taxes. To ensure that they would start paying, the Duke ordered that instead of the heads of household being sent to debtors' prison, the children of the household would be sent instead. This very ship was the one supposed to take them to the Southern Isles for the remainder of their days, but Roberts commandeered the ship, and these blokes were more than happy to help, and as you can see, several of them decided to stay."

"The Duke had the _children_ sent to debtor's prison?" her sister asked, sounding horrified. Anna just laughed, "If you think that's bad, you _really_ don't know anything about your 'trade partner'."

"If that is indeed the case, then it seems I will need to reevaluate Weselton as a trade partner to Arendelle." Elsa said firmly, and Anna looked at her sharply.

"You'd do that?" Asked Anna, surprised her sister would do that.

"I will not have people think that Arendelle or myself condone such behavior," stated Elsa simply, "and besides, if the 'Duck' as you call him really did have me kidnapped, then cutting off trade will be the least of his worries."

Anna grinned, enjoying both the conversation and the wind on her face. Her sister hadn't really opened up to her (not that Anna had expected her to), but she _had_ stopped being hostile. Although the Queen understood why the senior members of the crew were supposed to watch her, she had made it clear she preferred 'Andrews' and Chatterbox to be the ones watching.

"Hey, Mr. Andrews," Called one of the deckhands, "how 'bout a song?"

Several of the men cheered in agreement, and Anna rolled her eyes. They always did this once they had discovered she often sang when she worked, and after a rather drunk incident involving shanties. Anna tried to think of a shanty that sounded good, but nothing seemed to stand out to her. Then she looked sideways at her sister, and a song burst into her mind. Clearing her throat, she began to sing, careful to keep her voice at a deeper timbre.

"_Born of cold and winter air _

_ And mountain rain combining,_

_ This icy force both foul and fair_

_ Has a frozen heart worth mining._

_ So cut through the heart;_

_ Cold and clear._

_ Strike for love and strike for fear,_

_ See the beauty sharp and sheer_

_ Split the ice apart and break the frozen heart!"_

The Crewmen grinned, and one pulled out a fiddle and played with the song, as the others began to chant, and sing with her;

"_Hup, Ho! Watch yer step! Let it go!_

_ Hup, Ho! Watch yer step! Let it go!_

_ Beautiful, Powerful, Dangerous, Cold:_

_ Ice has a magic, Can't be controlled._

_ Stronger than one!_

_ Stronger than ten!_

_ Stronger than a hundred men, rah!_

_ Born of cold and winter air_

_ And mountain rain combining,_

_ This icy force both foul and fair_

_ Has a frozen heart worth mining._

_ Cut through the Heart:_

_ Cold and clear._

_ Strike for love and strike for fear._

_ There's beauty and there's danger here!_

_ Split the ice apart; beware the frozen heart…"_

The song ended ominously, and Anna smiled as the crewmen tried to hold the last note the longest. Anna looked at Elsa out of the corner of her eyes, and saw her sister staring at her intently, with a look on her face that Anna could not quite place.

* * *

***Thank you for catching that (not so) little flub. I can't believe I did that XP**


	9. Chapter 8: The Pain of the Past

**I do not own Frozen **

**WARNING: Lots of ANGST**

**See bottom for important A/N**

* * *

Chapter 8

_Present Day_

The Queen of Arendelle was beginning to question several things. First of all, there was what she had learned from Andrews about Weselton, sending children to debtor's prison (an idea which horrified her). Then there was the captain, who was the most feared man in all the seas, and yet so far she had yet to be given a reason not to trust him; so far the man had kept his word to her, and had even had his crew members protect her (_or at least try to_, _since I made it rather difficult,_ she thought rather embarrassed), and then there was the Quartermaster himself.

Andrews was by far the greatest conundrum she had ever laid eyes on. He was easily the most optimistic person she had ever met, and was respected by everyone on the decks. He was kind, but firm, and wasn't afraid to fight if need be, which she had seen from when… well, when she had forgotten that diplomatic immunity did not exist on Pirate ships.

* * *

_She had been standing on the Gunner deck towards the prow, rather annoyed with the whole situation. She had spoken to the captain earlier and he had told her he was going to keep her below decks when they reached Corona. Which she understood the reasoning for, but it did not help her pride any. The officer (she still wasn't sure what to call him) suddenly turned to look at one of the cannons, and Elsa took the opportunity to look around. Two rows of Cannons lined the outer edge of the level, one on the port side and one on the starboard. Between the cannons however was a inner room, which cut through the center of the deck. She had approached the doorway when it suddenly opened before her, and a rather large man walked out of it. He looked at her for a moment, and then gave a gentlemanly bow, holding the door open for her. _

_ She had glanced at the who was still busy with the cannon, and nodded her head in thanks to the crewman before stepping inside the door. The inside was a tiny hallway, toward the back was a row of doors, probably the rooms for the officers, toward the front though was another door. She walked forward, curious, and opened it. Inside was a room filled with bunk beds surrounding the edges of room, and sleeping mats covering the floor. Several crewmen were on the floor, some playing cards or dice, others simply talking._

_ "Lost sweetheart?" breathed a voice in her ear, causing the Queen to jump slightly._

_ "I think not," she replied, her voice cold, "but thank you for your concern."_

_ "Well," Asked another, who had been playing cards, "ain't you tha' lady the capn' had us take hostage?"_

_ Elsa had felt unease grow, though she pushed it down; she was the Queen of Arendelle, even if she was in disguise, any man would be terrified of retribution if they hurt her. So she had steeled herself and replied to the man's question._

_ "Yes," she had said crisply, "what of it?"_

_ The man who had first looked at her looked at her, "Well, for starters, that makes you loot."_

_ She had had barely enough time to scream, as the two men had grabbed her and forced her onto the nearest sleeping mat…_

* * *

Elsa shivered violently at the memory (which was not a common occurrence considering she was practically immune to cold). She had learned much that day, not only about her own actions that day, but that quartermaster's as well. He had come to her rescue; had fought and even killed some of his own crew, which she now realized was a rare occurrence. The crewmembers were incredibly close to one another, much like a big family, that Andrews would kill one to protect her was… confusing to her in the least. Not that she wasn't grateful- she was to the extreme- but it certainly gave her a lot to think about.

Then there was the fact that the man knew her from before. When he had first seen her he had known her name, a fact she had yet to confront him about. She was not certain how he had learned it, or how he knew her on sight; she had been secluded in the castle that most of her own people had no idea what she looked like. Then there was the fact he had called her by her name. he had called her _Elsa _not Queen Elsa, or the Queen of Arendelle, but her actual name, which suggested that the man somehow had known her on a more personal level. She had been wracking her brain for anyone that might fit that description, but she had come up empty. If he had been a servant before the… _accident,_ then he would have called her by her title, rather than her name. He had also known she ate with her gloves on, as proven when the Captain Roberts had lost the bet when she had first truly met the man. Whatever the case was, the man was throwing her for a loop, and the Queen of Arendelle did not appreciate being left in the dark on such matters.

Elsa sighed heavily. She had a sense of foreboding about what the answer would be when it was finally revealed. She got off of her seat on the bed, and left her cabin, one of the spares, telling Gerda she would be on the top deck. She left her cabin, and went as fast as she dared to the ladder that led to the top decks. Then stopped, for in one of the cabins, was the Quartermaster himself, speaking with the Bosun. From what she could tell, they seemed to be arguing about something. Elsa knowing that if she went any closer they would spot her, strained her ears to hear what they were saying.

"-only a matter of time until she figures it out, though," Andrews was saying in a hushed whisper, "She's a lot of things, but she isn't stupid. That's why they wanted her to become Queen after all."

"That may be the case," the Bosun, Chatterbox if she recalled correctly, agreed, "but we both don't know whether or not we can trust her. If she was in on that royal decree…"

"I know, I know," Andrews answered with a sigh, "it's just… thirteen years of nothing, and now that there's no door, I can't talk to her. It's driving me nuts!"

Now it was the Bosun's turn to sigh, "I understand, but remember; her door was closed when you needed her the most, we don't know whether or not that has changed. Just, don't get your hopes up, alright? None of us want to see you hurt like that again."

Andrews nodded, and Elsa knew it was time to leave. She quickly went the rest of the way to the ladder that led to the top deck. A man gave a shout, and Elsa stood up on the deck of the ship.

It was night; the stars were brighter than she had ever seen them out in Arendelle. The waves were slightly choppy, and made the boat shift underfoot, which made Elsa glad she had worn her boots rather than heels on her trip. The Queen walked over to the edge of the boat and looked at the horizon. As far as the eye could see, there was glittering ocean, though there was also what looked like a large bank of dark fog, a mile or more away. The wind seemed to pick up, and she felt her bun threaten to untie into its braid. After a moment of deliberation, Elsa took the pins that held it up out, and put her styled braid over her left shoulder. She smiled softly; she hadn't had her hair down like this since… Elsa sighed, but knew she couldn't hide from the memories forever.

_Anna._ Her mother and father never had told her why the guards had been chasing her, and every time she asked Kai, Gerda, or even the guards themselves, the story would always change. Sometimes it was because she had not wanted to leave Arendelle for boarding school. Other times it was because Anna had taken something from one of the Royal guards to use in one of her crazy escapades to get Elsa to open the door (_remembering those always makes me smile,_ the Queen thought with a melancholic grin). Then there was the fight; the one that had happened before Anna had started being chased. _No one _had ever told her what it was about; not Kai or Gerda, or even her parents themselves. Not even Anna herself when she asked about it in her letters.

_The letters_; that was another thing that never sat well with the older sibling. Although Anna's letters from boarding school always made her smile, especially since she usually got them when she needed them the most; after heavy workloads with her tutors, or exceptionally hard nights, when her powers and anxieties became too much for her. Kai, Gerda, or even sometimes mama, or papa would come and give her a letter saying that it was from Anna. But eventually, even the letters hadn't sat well with her; sometimes the letters were too uniform, lacking Anna's usual levels of enthusiasm. Other times it was because Anna would describe something, and (to Elsa at least) it was almost as if it were scripted. The thing that had her the most concerned however, was the one thing that she had never told anyone about, knowing they would tell her she was overreacting: the handwriting. One day when she had been feeling the strain of her position as Princess, Elsa had taken out all of the letters and had looked them over. After rereading them a few times, to calm herself down, she had noticed something peculiar; the handwriting in each letter was… different _and_ similar. It was as if one person had written some of the letters, another person had written others, and a third and fourth person had contributed. In some cases, the four handwritings would be on one letter, though it would only be one or two, and they would always be extremely similar… and yet there would always be something that was different enough for her to know it wasn't the same person.

Finally there were the times that Anna had 'come home'. Usually it was during a break of some sort, and Anna would be 'home', or so Elsa was told, because Elsa never saw her, and Anna never knocked on her door. Elsa usually brushed it off, telling herself that Anna didn't want to talk to her, especially after how she had treated her that last time. Except, Anna would always 'be home' to take business trips with her parents to other kingdoms. "Princess training" they had called it, for when Elsa became Queen, it would be Anna who would go to the other Kingdoms an negotiate agreements and such. Although all of this was normal behavior, the one thing that really got Elsa feeling uneasy, was the fact that during these times, nothing happened. No crazy stunts, no maids running around trying to get Anna to do something, and (most importantly in Elsa's opinion) there were no complaints from the kitchens about chocolate, or other sweet foods having gone missing. It was as if Anna was not really there at all…

Elsa shook herself, _that's ridiculous,_ she told herself sternly, _you are overreacting; just because you did not see her does not mean she was not around at all, after all I was in my room most… okay, _all_ of the time anyway._ Elsa sighed and ignored the nagging sensation that refused to go away, just like all the other times she had thought of her sister. _Focus Elsa, _she scolded herself, _it's not like you can just ask around for clues-_ Elsa froze. _Roberts._ If anyone could find out the truth it would be a pirate; Roberts had already proven himself capable of finding classified information, and other Intel that people did not want discovered. If anyone could find out what had happened to Anna that day it would be him! And then… _What?_ Elsa's cynical side shot back, _it is not like you can do anything about it now, remember? All you would be doing is chasing ghosts._ She sighed again, there was no use looking now… well aside from give her a sense of closure. After a moment of deliberation, she grabbed the letters from Anna that she had taken with her, squared her shoulders and started to walk back to the crew's quarters, only for her stomach to remind her she hadn't eaten yet.

_Food first,_ she decided after a short internal debate. She went to the door that led to the Galley and pushed it open. Immediately several things hit her senses; the loud shouts of people cooking, loud clangs of various pots and pans clanking together, and the sound of someone singing.

"_Ta rah rah BOOM de yay! Ta rah rah BOOM de yay!" _The voice belted happily, and started loudly humming the rest of the notes.

Elsa followed the 'music' until she found a young man, happily humming in front of a large pot. Elsa politely cleared her throat, and he turned to face her.

"Good morning, Your Majesty," he said happily his voice holding a slight British accent, and a large smile on his face, "what brings you to my side of the ship? Wait, don't answer that yet. O'Malley?!"

There was a loud yowl, and a large dark orange cat jumped onto the table beside the pot. The man's grin grew impossibly wider, and he took a piece of meat and tossed it to the beast. "There ya go you old alley cat! Off you go then, go chase some mice or something." The cat jumped off the table, and ran off out of sight.

"You was sayin'?" asked the man again, turning to face her yet again, still smiling.

"I was wondering if you had something left over that I could eat rather quickly," she explained, her voice as regal as always.

"Oh, you're hungry!" and the grinning man quickly reached into a cupboard behind him, and pulled out a bowl, and filled it with what was in the pot, "Catch of the day, Your Majesty, and better than usual, thanks to Corona."

Elsa slowly tasted the stew, it was surprisingly good. She looked at him curiously, "thanks to Corona? How so, may I ask?"

"Indeed you may," he laughed, "and I shall answer. Corona is infamous for two things; fantastic booze, and the ability to buy spices in bulk, for not as much coin as other places… if ya know where to go that is, as is with most things mind you. Oh, names Pike by the by."

Elsa suddenly had an idea, and looked at the man, Pike, intently, "If one was looking to find someone, where would they go?"

Pike blinked, and started stirring the pot again, "well, that all depends; if who you're looking for is on the ship, not on the ship, or even alive. Each one would point ya in a dif'rent direction. So who exactly is ya lookin' for, if I may?"

"I am not looking for where they are, per say, more where they have been. And as for who I am looking for… what do you know of Princess Anna of Arendelle?"

Pike dropped his ladle, and stared at her intently, his smile suddenly gone. He took a deep breath, and spoke carefully, "why? With all due respect, according to all official records, she died with your parents."

Elsa kept her face neutral, but her mind was turning rapidly; he _knew_ something, she was certain of it, based on his reaction, but judging by his answer, he was probably not going to tell her. She collected her thoughts and spoke carefully, "if you must know, that is exactly why I want to know; for closure, I suppose you could say. Now, you did not answer my question; what do you know of my sister?"

Pike seemed to choose his words carefully, "I know she was the second born sister of Arendelle, three years younger than you. I know that accordin' to all most Palace records she was in Corona, for most of her life, and that the only time she wasn't was when she was traveling on business of sorts. And then she died, on the same ship as your parents, according to what everyone says."

Elsa looked at him sharply, and decided to do what she did best; talking politically.

Elsa's face still neutral, as well as her voice, she responded, "and what about what people_ do not_ say?"

Pike's eye twitched slightly, and then he gave a grudging smile, "This'll teach me to talk semantics with a Queen… though to answer your question, I'm afraid it's not my place to say. If you're _really_ serious about it though… talk to the Captain, or the Quartermaster, they'll know more than me anyways."

Elsa smiled and thanked him, and left the Galley, placing her now empty bowl, in a barrel full of soaking dirty dishes.

_So, there are people who know what happened to her on this ship, but I do not want to confront either the Captain or Andrews just yet. I wonder if there is anyone else who knows anything on board?_ She wondered, and then spotted the first mate standing by the stairwell, leading to the stern. She steeled herself, and then walked over to him. Before she could say anything, however he spoke first; "If you have something to say, say it, and quickly."

"Very well," she said simply, her political mask in place, "what do you know of Princess Anna of Arendelle?"

He looked at her sharply; "did the Captain ask you to ask that?" the First mate (Kay she believed he was called) demanded, his tone sharp.

"And if he did?" she replied, wanting to see his reaction.

He said nothing for a moment, and then gave a humorless smile, "nothing; because he did nothing of the sort, I can see it on your face. Good try though; you're good. I'll give you that."

"So," she insisted, a little surprised that he had seen through her bluff, "what _can_ you tell me, of Princess Anna?"

"According to all official records, she was born three years after you, and then died three years ago. That's it."

"What do you mean that's it?" she retorted before she could stop herself. The First mate stared at her for a moment before replying.

"Exactly that. There is nothing else to know, because there is no other information. According to all official sources, she lived, and then she died. There is nothing in between. There's nothing more I can say, so don't bother asking." And with that he turned, and started yelling at a crewman who was tying a sail down wrong.

Elsa stood there, thinking hard about what he had said. _Nothing? At all? How is that even possible? She was the Princess; should there not be something more?_

She had hoped for answers, and yet, all she was finding were more questions. Perhaps she would have to speak to the Quartermaster after all. _Speak of the devil,_ Elsa thought to herself, as the very man appeared on the deck. She briskly walked over to him and cleared her throat before he could walk away.

Andrews turned and looked at her, looking surprised, "What brings you out here, and at this hour, Your Majesty?"

"Questions. Ones I have not been able to answer for a long time, which I now find may be able to be solved here." She replied. The Quartermaster blinked, and frowned slightly.

"I'm not sure if I'm the right person to ask about politics," Andrews began, but the Queen shook her head.

"I am not referring to politics, actually," Elsa began, and then had an idea. She pulled out three of the letters Anna had written her, and showed them to the Quartermaster. "What can you tell me about these?"

"Aside from the fact they were written by different Palace servants of Arendelle?" he asked confused. Elsa's heart stopped. She stared at the man, who was still staring at the letters, "why are you even asking me? Wiz is the expert on this kind of thing…" his voice trailed off, and she saw his eyes widen and his face pale, as his eyes saw the end of the letters.

"I am asking you," said Elsa simply, "because I need to know what really happened to my sister. I had suspected that those letters were not truly written by her, but neither my parents, servants, nor the castle guard would tell me anything. It was like she simply… ceased to exist, I am sorry to say."

Andrews stared at her, and seemed to be having an internal debate of sorts. Then he beckoned for her to follow him, and he turned back toward the ladder leading below decks, and went below, with Elsa close behind. He walked quickly through the Gunner deck and through the door that led to the quarters, through the cramped hallway, and then stopped in front of his quarters.

"Wait here," he told her, and went inside. Elsa did wait, but she listened intently for any sound that might tell her what he was doing. Finally, she heard a click, a rustle of parchment, and a solid thunk of a lid closing. _The chest,_ she realized, remembering the one time she had been in the man's room, _there was a chest next to the doorway on the other side of the bed, where he got the medical supplies from. It would make sense that that was not the only thing kept inside a trunk that big._

The door opened again, and the Quartermaster handed her an official looking scroll, with a broken Arendelle seal on it. She reached out to take it, but looked at him when he did not immediately let go.

"You might want to sit down for this." He told her quietly, and Elsa nodded, not fully understanding. She walked back into her room, and was a bit surprised to see Andrews following her, though she made no move to stop him. They both entered and Elsa sat down in the chair while the Quartermaster, sat across from her on the bed, looking strangely nervous.

Elsa slowly opened the scroll. It was an official document of sorts; she realized instantly, a royal proclamation in fact, from the time of her parents, stating that… her sister had been banished from all official records, that it had been made so that Anna had never been born.

The Queen felt… she didn't even know _what_ she was feeling, there were so many emotions roiling around inside of her. She did not ever realize she was shaking until Andrews gently took her gloved hands. She jumped from the contact, and gaped at him, and she realized from the mirror behind the Quartermaster, that she wore a expression of horror on her face. Elsa struggled to say something, _anything _but her mouth and mind refused to work, and no words would come. Finally, one word made its way out of the Queen's mouth; "why?!"

"She ran away." Andrews whispered, his voice seemed strangely higher than normal, almost as if he too were having trouble speaking, "about seven years ago, your sister had a bit of a falling out with your parents. No one would say why, or what it was about. Only that they sent the guards after her to throw her out of the Castle, only she got out first."

"They say she fled to the North Mountain," a new voice spoke, and they both jumped, and turned to find the Captain Roberts looking at them with a serious expression. "though nothing was ever made official. Then, according to a few unofficial channels, about four and a half years ago, an ice harvester by the name of Kristoff Bjorgman came to the castle, with what was rumored to be the Princess's remains."

Elsa did not know what she was thinking, there were so many things swirling through her head. So many things suddenly clicked into place, and yet, instead of closure, she felt guilt: massive and oppressive, and threatening to crush her from the inside. One thing stood out to her, one last piece of the puzzle left unsolved.

"You know, don't you," she managed to say, though her throat was tight. "what the falling out was about. Tell me, please."

Roberts looked at Andrews, and Andrews spoke, his voice sounding numb. "You," he said quietly, "they were fighting about you. Your sister wanted to know why you had shut everyone out, and well, one of your parents let slip that it was because you were having a… problem of sorts; wouldn't say what though. Anyway, she wanted to help you, she thought that since she was your sister, and that she was a part of their family, that they should let her help. Well, to make a long story short, they pretty much told her that she wasn't part of the family at all, just the spare, and to 'focus on not failing her lessons, and to stop complaining about her sister'. As you can imagine, she… didn't take it well, and when she refused to drop the issue... they told her to 'get out', and sent the guards to make sure she did so."

Elsa felt herself go numb, as one realization hit her like a tidal wave; "it's all my fault," she rasped quietly, her horror mounting, "I-I always thought… that day when s-she… oh gods!"

Her mask crumbled, and she felt hot tears streak down her face, as he body began to tremble with both shock and suppressed sobs. One question, seemed to stay, even through the maelstrom of thoughts and emotions coursing through her; "what have I done?"

"You didn't know," Andrews spoke, and held out the letters, "your parents… they hid it from you, so there was no way you could have known. And most importantly, nothing you could have done."

Elsa looked at him, her tears making her vision a colorful blur, as a single realization hit her, "there was something I could have done," she said softly, her voice breaking slightly as a sob made it through her throat, "she came to me, she _begged_ me to… all those years I thought I was protecting her by keeping her away… and the one time she needed me most… when opening the door would have done more to protect her than keeping it shut, I… my sister is _dead_, because of me!"

She could hold it back no more. She sobbed, her body shuddering, and shaking, as realizations consumed her. She had failed; everything she had done to protect Anna had been for _nothing_. Her parents had lied to her, for years on end, telling servants to write letters addressed from her sister. She had always thought it was fate that 'Anna' had sent letters when she had always felt the most overwhelmed, when she had needed her the most, and now she knew there was no coincidence. Her parents had probably ordered the letters written _because_ Elsa had been overwhelmed with stress, anger, or fears, knowing that a letter would help calm her down, keep her from freezing the Castle into one huge block of ice…

_My powers,_ Elsa's logical side tried to say, but even her concern for revealing her magic was overwhelmed by her realizations. Anna was dead. Dead and gone. Had been for years, and Elsa had not known, not mourned, until it was much too late. She didn't know how long she stayed curled there; it could have been hours, days, months even. She didn't care. Why should she? Everything that mattered was long gone. When the tears had run out, she had curled on the bed, and simply stayed there. Sometimes she saw what was happening around, but mostly the only thing she was aware of was her guilt, her failures, her ghosts swirling around her. Why should she even care anymore? If she couldn't save the _one_ thing that mattered most to her in the world, how was she worthy of having an entire Kingdom to-

The ship suddenly rocked violently, and Elsa was instantly slammed back into reality, as she hit the floor of her cabin. Her mind managed to collect itself enough to wonder just what was going on when-

_Thunder;_ _a lot_ of thunder. Elsa didn't even know she was moving until she was no longer below decks, and being pelted with heavy wet drops. She looked up in time to see a flash of light, shatter the darkness, and then vanish as quickly as it had come. She heard the crash of thunder that followed the lightning, she heard the Captain screaming orders to his men, she saw…

One minute she was on the deck, the next a massive wave came out of nowhere, and hit the ship head on in its starboard side, and the ship tilted, violently. The next moment, Elsa was falling. She heard someone scream her name… and then, for the first time in forever… she was cold.

It was a very strange sensation for her, being cold. It took her a moment to realize the cold was coming from the water that surrounded her… _I fell off the boat,_ Elsa realized suddenly, _I'm sinking, I'm drowning!_ Adrenaline kicked in and Elsa tried to fight the tide that was forcing her in every direction at once. Her eyes burned, her lungs screamed, and her hands glowed.

But the water only got colder. _That's right,_ a logical part of Elsa's brain realized, _salt water is harder to freeze than normal water, by the time I would make any ice to float to the surface on, I would be dead… like Anna._ That thought stopped her thrashing. Anna; wasn't that where she belonged? With her sister? _It wouldn't be so bad_, she realized, everyone in Arendelle probably already thought she was dead, since her ship had not returned from Corona. It wasn't like this would be the first time the Kingdom had lost a monarch to the ocean's wrath…

A lone figure suddenly seemed to be coming toward her. A figure she knew well… but was different. Familiar sea blue eyes, and dark strawberry blond hair, with an unmistakable single streak of platinum blond running through her right braid. The tanned, freckled familiar face, stared at Elsa with a look of panic, and then a pair of arms grabbed her, and pulled her down… no; pulled her _up_.

There was a splash, and suddenly, everything sharpened into focus. Holding on to her, pulling her up the side of _The Mourning Angel_ was Anna, but not the Anna she remembered; this Anna was older, as if she had never died, as if she had lived and aged like Elsa had. She was still shorter than Elsa, but she was leaner, and her muscles though small, were hard, and her figure was slightly boyish. Her little sister stared at Elsa, her eyes still filled with panic, and when Elsa saw her lips move, she realized her sister was talking, no, yelling at her.

"Elsa!" Anna cried, staring at her with horror, "don't you dare! Don't you _dare_ die on me!" Anna seemed to hug her closer, and Elsa felt her warmth, despite the deathly cold of the wind, and sea around them.

"Please," Anna pleaded with her, her eyes were filled with both tears and desperation, "I can't lose you… not again. Elsa, please, you're the older one: you don't get to _give up_! You have a kingdom, a kingdom with people who needs you to be their voice when they themselves cannot be. Elsa, you can't live like this; the past is in the past, you can't change it, but you can change what you do now. Don't shut me out. Don't shut the world out. You don't have to be afraid anymore… especially when you never should have been in the first place." Her voice was quieter now, and filled with heartbreak and sadness.

Elsa could sense her consciousness beginning to ebb, so she forced herself to speak through the water in her lungs; she had to say it now, even though it should have been said so much sooner.

"Anna," Elsa choked, and her sister stared at her, eyes wide, "p-please, forgive me… I'm so s-sorry…"

Anna suddenly choked back a sob, and held Elsa impossibly closer, "Oh Elsa," Anna whispered in her ear, and though the sea, creak of the boat, and cracks of thunder, she still heard, "how can I forgive you, when there is nothing to forgive?"

Elsa stared at Anna, and saw her little sister smiling at her; a smile that laid no blame, and held only love and kindness. Elsa felt the guilt that had weighed on her for so long slowly begin to ebb away, like the tides. Then, for the first time in thirteen years, Elsa felt… light. There was no guilt, no anxiety, no pain, no regret, and for one glorious moment, Elsa felt true happiness, and love, and the feeling of her sister's arms around her.

And then, she felt nothing at all.

* * *

**BatteriezNotIncluded here: I have several points that I would like to make in this author's note.**

**Firstly; I cannot believe I need to do this but I need to set ground rules for reviews. I like reviews, don't get me wrong, and constructive criticism is awesome, but to those who absolutely have to hate and it is physically impossible for you not to do so: RESTRAIN YOURSELF TO ONE REVIEW PER FANFIC! Do not spam my review pages with your whining! If have to hate, then just say your piece and give a good reason why and leave it at that. If ANYONE leaves more than one 'hate' in my review box starting after this chapter is uploaded, I will delete your review! I DO NOT want to that to ANYONE, so don't push it, PLEASE!**

**Secondly; thank you to all of you who point out when I make a mistake in my fics (like the last chapter), I really appreciate it and any other advice when it comes to my fics.**

**Lastly; I would like to thank all of you for your patience. With my internet being a bitch and my incredibly random spurts of inspiration, I get that a lot of people don't like a random update schedule, so your support means a lot to me!**


	10. Chapter 9: Decoy Disaster

**Disclaimer: I own nothing! All rights go to their respective owners**

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Chapter 9

_Five Years Ago_

_The Mourning Angel_ cut through the waters with swift precision. It had been a great year for piracy. The merchants, as usual thinking themselves invincible, had not bothered to spend extra money on their trade ships, making taking and locating them exceptionally easy. Although they spent time complaining to the royalty of wherever they resided, as none of their personal shipments had been taken, all the Kings and Queens did were to put their navy ships on alert for the rough descriptions of the infamous Jolly Rogers.

Chatterbox left Gawain's Cabin, leaving a full report on various objects and supplies that they had taken from their recent haul, as well as what the ship still needed. Gawain smiled when he saw just how much that Weselton frigate they had just left to sink was carrying, when he noticed something that required immediate attention. _We're out of gunpowder, and close to running out of both heavy shots, and mortars,_ Gawain realized, and grimaced. They were going to need to make a stop. Quickly tallying everything into his log book, Gawain left his Cabin and made for the wheel.

"Mr. Smarts, and Mr. Andrews," he called, and the Quartermaster quickly finished tying off the rope she was holding, before hurrying up to the wheel, the Navigator close behind.

"Where to this time, Captain?" Andrews asked, trademark grin on her face, and Gawain smiled back.

"Smarts, where's the nearest friendly port? It appears we're running a bit low on the essentials, if Chatterbox's numbers are correct."

Smarts quickly went over a small map on the railing next to the wheel. After a moment, he smiled and pointed to a point on the map, "Here, Captain Roberts, there's a secondary port located in Denmark; where King Eric and Queen Ariel rule. If we sail straight there we should get there after nightfall."

Roberts nodded and turned the wheel accordingly, "Andrews, you and I are going to go ashore. I'll deal with getting the supplies; you see what rumors you can dig up loot wise."

She nodded and turned to go below decks, and Gawain turned his attention to the ocean.

* * *

It was indeed well past nightfall when _The Mourning Angel_ finally docked at the hidden port in Denmark. Light shined from the taverns, and a few underground brothels. Gawain stepped off the deck of his ship, leaving Kay in charge. Andrews quickly followed him, and they set off in different directions. Gawain found a Harbor Master that was still awake and spent quite a bit of time haggling with the man for decent prices on both selling the goods his ship had plundered, as well as buying the supplies his crew needed. When everything was bought and paid for Gawain decided to try to find wherever Andrews had disappeared off to.

He began to walk around to the various taverns, and peeked inside to see if he could find his Quartermaster, however it became clear after he checked a third establishment that she had long since finished her information digging. Gawain was now slightly concerned; the both of them had agreed that if one of them finished early, that they would find the other, so that she wouldn't be left behind by accident. A scream suddenly sounded from west, and Gawain ran toward the sound, knowing that it was possible Andrews had something to do with it. As he came to an alleyway that the sound seemed to originate from, he heard a splash, and the sound of swords being drawn. Gawain drew his own sword and quickly surveyed the scene.

There were three men in the alleyway, two of which wore city guard uniforms, the third man however looked to be a homeless man of sorts, from the looks of his tattered cloak, but when the man turned, Gawain knew instantly something was off. The man's boots were dirty, buy they were too fine a quality, not expensive, but too expensive, and the same went for his trousers and shirt. All of his clothes, save the cloak he wore, seemed to be utilitarian, as if was a man used to hiding, and fighting. He was armed with two short swords, showing he wasn't an assassin, but he fought with the precision of someone who had been well trained, and easily overpowered the two guards. Gawain quickly made sure he was out of sight, and watched as the man slit the two guards' throats, before looking in a large well of sorts. He seemed to get something out of the well, and check it over. Gawain heard the man curse angrily, and a thud as he threw whatever it was to the side. Gawain listened for the footsteps of the man to fade before coming out and surveying the scene.

Gawain quickly looked around, and saw where the man had thrown whatever it had been that had fallen in the well. He quickly went over to it… no not it, her. It was the body of a girl, fairly short, with dark strawberry blond hair.

"Shit," Gawain muttered to himself, feeling his stomach drop, and turned the girl over. She was clearly dead, drowned, and the water on her skin made it look paler than it already was. Except for the fact the girl's hair was down, she was the splitting image of…

"Wow, I know people say we all have a twin in the world, but this is a little creepy," Said Andrews, whose hooded head was suddenly peering over Gawain's shoulder.

"Loki's lies, Anna," Gawain growled, keeping his voice below a whisper, "don't scare me like that! I thought this was you for a minute there."

"Sorry," she apologized quickly, and then reached down and opened one of the girl's eyes. It was a muddy brown.

"Except for the eyes and the freckles, she might just be me," Anna muttered under her breath, a faraway expression on her face, "I know this is going to sound weird, but I think we should take her with us; I don't think this is a coincidence."

Gawain just shrugged and wrapped the body in a nearby tarp, lying in the alley. Gawain and Andrews quickly grabbed the two ends of the body, and went back to the ship.

The ship was much more lively than usual, especially for so late at night, much to Gawain's suspicion. He continued wondering what was going on, when Kay came out of nowhere.

"Someone thought it would be a good idea to try to take an uninvited look around our ship" the giant rumbled, and Gawain's eyes narrowed.

"I hate stowaways," he muttered and then turned to Kay again, "what happed and where is the bastard."

"He came aboard a few minutes before you did," Kay glowered, "luckily Hawkeye spotted him and pointed him out to our guys in the rigging; got the jump on the fool, before he could draw his blades. He's in the hold."

Gawain's head suddenly clicked, "Blades? They wouldn't have happened to 'ave been two shot swords, would they?"

Kay's eyes narrowed and he nodded, "friend of yours?"

Gawain chuckled darkly, "not in the slightest; murdered this poor fool and a couple of guards."

Dropping the body off in the medical bay, and signaling for Wiz to follow him, Gawain went down to the hold. Sure enough, the man in the hold was the same one that had killed the three in the alley. The man looked up, and his eyes narrowed with spite when he saw Gawain standing before him.

"Damned Pirate Roberts," He snarled angrily, and Gawain rolled his eyes.

"That's _Dreaded_ Pirate Roberts," he corrected (while smirking internally at the nickname that had been unintentionally given to him by the Duke of Weselton), "though I suppose I can't expect you to know that, seeing as your stupid enough to try to sneak on board _my_ ship."

The man just glared at him and said nothing, so Gawain tried a different approach, "of course, you apparently are stupid enough to drown some poor prostitute, and kill two city guards, and so I suppose I can't really hold your lack of intelligence against you, so what exactly _were_ you doing trying to sneak aboard my ship?"

Other than the small twitch that appeared in the man's right fingers, he did not say anything. He wasn't going to say anything, and judging by his near lack of response he had been trained not to. Gawain grimaced; this man was obviously an official of some sort. Suddenly Wiz cleared his throat.

"Can I try Captain, pleaseplease pleeeeeeeeeease?" he begged, sounding like a child trying to open the first present on Christmas.

Gawain looked at the official and when the man smirked at him haughtily, Gawain made his decision.

"I don't care what you do, find out what the hell he was doing on my ship, and find out what he was trying to do murdering a woman in an alley." And with that he marched out of the hold. He wasn't halfway to the mid deck when the screaming started, followed by Wiz belting out opera at the top of his lungs.

* * *

"He was looking for the Princess of Arendelle," Wiz was telling Gawain, Andrews, and Kay forty five minutes later, with a huge grin plastered on his face.

Andrews choked slightly and Gawain stared at him incredulously, "the _banished_ Arendelle Princess?"

"Yep," Wiz replied, popping the 'p', "he was apparently a member of the Arendelle intelligence force under King Adgar. His job is was to find lookalikes to the Princess and observe them. If they fit a certain description, he was supposed to kidnap them and take them to a safe house for interrogation, if not… well, you saw what happened in the alley right?"

"Did he say why he was looking for these Princess Wannabes?" Asked Kay, looking a little worried, and Wiz nodded.

"Apparently, the King and Queen thought the Princess was dead, but when no body turned up, they started having second thoughts, so they sent their intelligence force to find people who fit the Princess's description, thinking someone was holding her hostage or something. I dunno, he decided to kill himself before I could ask for anything more specific."

"Well," Andrews grimaced, "this is just fantastic, not only are they messing up other peoples' lives, their going to make our lives harder in the process."

Gawain had to admit she was right; from what Wiz had told them from his 'interrogation' the King and Queen weren't going to stop searching unless they found Anna's body, which was impossible, because Anna wasn't dead…

"Andrews," Gawain asked suddenly, as a crazy idea entered his mind, "do you think they would stop looking if they found a body?"

"Just what are you implying…" her voice trailed off, when a look of understanding crossed what he could see of her face, "you're not thinking what I think your thinking are you? Because if you are thinking what I think your thinking then what your thinking is genius, though I think it's going to be a little more complicated than that, you think? Wait what?"

Gawain just smiled and looked at Wiz, "if you were given an exact description of the Arendelle Princess, would you be able to make a decoy?"

Wiz nodded, his eyes sparking with the prospect of a challenge, "I would need someone who already looked like her, but yeah, I can do that!"

Gawain smiled and the four of them went to the medical bay, and Gawain took the tarp off the girl's body. Wiz looked at the girl for a long time, taking measurements and observing certain body parts, as Gawain and Andrews gave a description of Princess Anna.

"So," Wiz said after a few minutes of his investigation, "I can do everything except the hair and the eyes. You mentioned the Princess has as a streak of white gold hair?"

"It's called _platinum blonde_ but yeah," Andrews nodded, and Wiz pouted.

"That color is impossible to dye, I could get close but it would never hold up under close inspection, and if this girl's the Princess, than there _will_ be a close inspection." He said sounding disappointed.

"Fix what you can, and leave the hair and the eyes for now," Gawain instructed him, "We'll find out what to do about them when we reach Arendelle. Hopefully we'll have a plan by then."

* * *

**Long story short… my muse has a nasty habit of taking vacations at the most terrible of times. Thank you all for being patient, and for those of you wondering; yes, Kristoff will be appearing in this fic, in fact (spoiler) he has a rather important part to play.**

**One last thing; Everything I write into this fic, whether POV and time period changes, I write for a reason. For those interested in looking, there are hints to the endgame in every chapter, even the ones that just seem like backstory or filler. Just know, that when the time comes, even if it seem convoluted, everything's purpose will be clear.**

**Peace out,**

**-BNI**


	11. Chapter 10: The Price of Magic

**Disclaimer: I own nothing!**

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Chapter 10

_Five Years Ago; Continued_

Arendelle had changed during the time Anna had been gone. The streets seemed dark and dreary, and the Kingdom as a whole seemed unwelcoming. It gave her the creeps, seeing her childhood home in such a state. As the Kingdom disappeared through the tree line, the small bag at her waist which held the proclamation of her banishment seemed to grow heavier. Anna wasn't sure why she brought it, but she had felt a need to, and so bring it she had.

She and Roberts had decided to dock on the outskirts of the fjord, just out of sight of the kingdom. It would be a several hour walk, but they were in a position to get to the city if need be. The one thing Anna was nervous about was the reveal they were going to do. Wiz had been right when he had said that there was nothing he could do to change the girl's hair and eyes. The eyes Anna supposed weren't a problem, but the lack of the streak of platinum blond was not so easily overlooked. She and the others, after much debate, had decided to leave the body in the mountains, on the trails the ice harvesters took, and then they would deliver it to the castle… hopefully. Gawain had admitted it would be nice if they could pay one of them off to do it, but he didn't want to take any chances. This was why Anna, Gawain, and Chatterbox were currently trudging up the pathway that led to the top of the North Mountain, with the body in tow.

After a long time (Anna wasn't sure _how _long), they were all stopped in front a small trading post, gawking at its sign.

"Is it normal for there to be a sauna in a trading post in Arendelle?" asked Gawain, looking rather bemused at the sign.

"Considering I never really left the Castle unless it was to see you guys, I have no idea," Anna replied truthfully, and equally surprised at the establishment.

"We may as well get supplies," Chatterbox pointed out, "our own stuff is made for open sea, I don't know how well it will work on mountains."

Anna had to agree with him there, and she saw Gawain did to, and turned to Chatterbox, "we'll stay with the body. You get whatever you think we'll need."

Chatterbox nodded and left. Gawain motioned to the stable, and the two of them quickly carried the 'package' inside to wait for him. A few minutes later, a sled full of ice, being pulled by a reindeer came to a stop in front of the trading post and the teenage boy driving walked inside, leaving his reindeer behind. Another minute passed and Chatterbox walked out of the trading post and over to the stable.

"Time to leave," he said simply, as he passed them the supplies. Anna noticed a small purse hidden in his shirt.

"You pick pocketed that ice harvester, didn't you?" She asked smirking slightly, a smirk which he returned.

"Like I said, we need to leave," he said simply, and with that, helped grab the body.

"Think we should take the sled?" Asked Roberts after a moment, "I have a feeling this thing is going to get heavier."

"Up to you," She said simply, and Roberts just shook his head sadly.

"If we get caught, then this is all for nothing," he sighed, and so the three of them continued up the mountain.

* * *

It was late, and Anna was keeping watch as the two boys slept. Though she had been in the forest the time she had snuck out of the passage, Anna had never really been in it long enough to really admire it. Although it was dark, the woods were rather beautiful; the trees were massive and tall, the ground was strangely soft, except for the needles that fell from said trees, and the gnarled roots that came up every few feet. There were cricket sounds, rustling of animals moving in the trees, and the occasional howl of a wolf, all of which Anna found intriguing. Until she heard a soft snap of a nearby twig, and quickly kicked the boys awake.

The three of them pretended to be asleep, as a teen snuck into the clearing. From what Anna could see through her eyelashes, the man was incredibly tall and muscular, with a mop of the unmanliest blonde hair she had ever seen. The man snuck over to Chatterbox, and with a sure swipe, grabbed the pouch that the Bosun had pick-pocketed. The guy opened the pouch and seemed to do some counting of what was inside, before she heard the man grind his teeth in frustration, as he discovered that there was significantly less inside of it than before. He slowly backed away from the three of them, before suddenly stopping at the body.

He slowly bent down, pulling out a small knife his belt, and pulling the tarp off of the body. She saw the teen's face pale, and glance quickly over at the three of them. Suddenly, the ice harvester grabbed the body, hauled it over his shoulder and took off running.

"Shit!" Cried Chatterbox, as the three of them vaulted to their feet and charged after the man. The ice harvester, who had heard the curse, glanced behind him and saw the three of them charging after him.

"Sven!" the guy cried, and out of nowhere, a reindeer ran beside the man, and the ice harvester hauled himself and the body on the animal, before charging off.

"Things just got a whole lot harder," Anna muttered, panting slightly as the three pirates slowed to a stop, "I hope one of you knows how to track a reindeer."

Chatterbox nodded slowly, "I did some animal tracking in these woods before I met Gawain. Just give me a minute; I haven't done this in a while."

"Would you mind showing me?" Asked Anna curiously, and Chatterbox smiled and nodded.

After a few dead ends, and red herrings, Chatterbox finally found the trail the reindeer and the ice harvester had taken. It veered surprisingly away from the capital city, and instead led to a different part of the mountain. This part seemed to lead to a higher spot on the mountain, though not directly to the summit. This path seemed to lead through a part of the mountain with an underground spring of sorts, judging by the clouds of steam coming from various holes in the ground. Finally, after what seemed like several hours, the three of them arrived at a strange circular clearing.

From what Anna could see, the clearing had several layers, like a stage, and on each were rocks. Even the rocks were strange; perfectly round, with each having a round patch of moss on it. In the center of the clearing, surrounded by the rocks were the ice harvester and his reindeer. The body had been lain down in front of them and they both seemed to be waiting for something.

"Anna," Gawain murmured, "distract him. Chatterbox and I will go around the side."

Anna went to agree with him, when something stopped her. This clearing… it seemed familiar somehow. Deciding to trust her instincts she shook her head and spoke softly, "no, I've got this," and pulled one of the pistols out of her chest holster, and stepped into the clearing and aimed her pistol at him.

"Nice spot you got here," she said in her 'Andrews voice' and the kid jumped, and his eyes widened, before narrowing.

"If you're going to kill me like you did this girl, then do it like a man," he said bravely, pulling out his knife.

Anna glared at him, "As hard as it may be for you to believe, I had nothing to do with her death. And I _really_ don't want to kill you for being in the wrong place at the wrong time."

He blinked, and eyed her suspiciously, "what about the other two you had with you?"

"She was dead when we found her," Anna told him, "and my companions had nothing to do with it either. Look; give her back and we'll let you and your pet moose go."

"Reindeer," the ice harvester growled, "and no, I won't let you desecrate this girl anymore, so if you want her, come and get her!"

Anna grimaced, but sheathed her pistol and charged at the man. She ducked under his punch and threw one of her own. Her fist connected with his jaw and the mountain man stumbled, before throwing both his hands forward pushing her back, hard. Anna flew backward and hit one of the rocks, and felt her hood slip off her head, her two braids fall out and into view. She heard him gasp as she held up her hands.

"I'm telling the truth, okay?" Anna told him now frustrated with the ice harvester, "All we were doing was taking her close to the summit. Relax; we were going to make sure it was a place she would be found."

"How do I know you aren't lying?" demanded the ice harvester, "your friend stole my money, how am I supposed to know you all aren't crooks, huh, how?!"

"STOP!" came a sudden shout, and the two of them (three including the reindeer) turned to see one of the rocks rolling toward them and then uncurl itself to reveal…

"Trolls," Anna muttered, suddenly seeing the round boulders in a new light, "they're trolls!"

The troll that was currently standing in front of the mountain man though was incredibly short (he only went up to the kid's knee) had a look of wisdom about him, and wore a necklace of yellow crystals around his neck. The old troll gave a look of shock when he saw Anna and the body, and slowly put his hands on the dead girl's head.

"She's telling the truth, Kristoff," the old troll told him, "They had nothing to do with the poor girl's death. But could one of you tell me why her appearance was changed to look like you?" he gestured to Anna.

Anna suddenly had a nagging sensation, as she looked at the old troll; she knew him from somewhere, almost as if she had seen him in a dream… her hand unconsciously went to her streak of platinum blond, and she made her decision. She told him everything; how she had been shut out by her sister, how her parents had kicked he out, how Gawain had taken her in, how she had been erased from existence, and how the girl had been killed by an agent of her parents simply because Anna had been the true target.

"…So we figured that if they found 'my' body, they would stop sending spies to track me down, and killing innocent people who just happen to look like me out of paranoia." She finished, and the old troll sat down, hard.

Anna slowly took out the box with the proclamation of her banishment, "if you need proof then read this."

The troll took the scroll, and read it. His eyes widened, and then he sighed. The old troll looked at Anna with a look of sadness and regret. Meanwhile, the teenage mountain man was staring at her slack jawed, with a look of pity. He looked about to say something, when something stirred in her mind, a scene from a dream she had had long ago…

"I know you," she said suddenly, looking at the old troll, and the troll looked at her with shock clear on his face, "you know how I got this, don't you?" she touched the blonde streak in her hair, and the old troll sighed.

"Yes," the old troll admitted, "I do know where that streak in your hair came from. But I cannot tell you, I swore an oath of secrecy to your parents… I am sorry. I had hoped I had _helped_ your family that day, but it would seem I have _done_ more damage than repair to it."

"Could you help me?" She asked the troll, "Do you have anything that would give her a blond streak like mine, and change her eye color? We did everything else, and it would make sure that Mama and Papa would stop… looking for me."

The troll sighed, and looked at Anna sadly, "I must think about it. Kristoff, please, take the Princess-

"I'm not a Princess anymore," she reminded him, "just 'Anna' is fine."

The troll nodded sadly, "very well, Kristoff, take Anna to the outskirts of the valley. I need to discuss things with the others, and Anna?"

She turned to the troll, and he gave her a wry smile, "Could you bring your two companions with you?"

Anna smiled back at the troll, and gave a whistle. Gawain and Chatterbox came out and for a moment stared stunned at the troll, before Anna beckoned them to follow her. The four of them, came to a small set of normal stones, surrounding one of the steam holes, like a campfire of sorts. Anna sat down, and Chatterbox went after Gawain, who went out further into the forest.

The mountain man, Kristoff, seemed to be having an internal debate of sorts, when Anna turned to him, and smiled, "Wanna sit down?" she gestured to the rock next to hers, and after a moment, he sat down.

"Sorry about your pouch. You're not still mad at _me_, are you?" Asked Anna and Kristoff jumped slightly.

"No," he said, looking slightly embarrassed, "I wasn't mad at you for that, but I'm sorry I thought you murdered that girl."

Anna shrugged, "for what it's worth; I probably would have thought the same thing if I had been in your position. I don't blame you for jumping to conclusions, and besides; Chatterbox's little pick pocketing escapade certainly didn't help matters."

Kristoff seemed to chuckle at that, "Yeah, I was pretty mad about that," he admitted.

Anna just smiled, and shrugged again. They sat in companionable silence for a few minutes, and then Kristoff cleared his throat.

"I'm sorry about your parents," he told her quietly, "when I was a baby; my parents left me on the ice harvester path. When the men came by, they found I had nearly frozen to death… I probably would have, if it wasn't for Sven. He found me and curled up on top of me, and it kept me alive long enough to be found. Then for a while, it was just me and Sven, until we found the trolls and they took us in."

Anna thought for a moment, and then asked, "How did you manage to find the trolls?"

Kristoff shuffled uncomfortably, and then seemed to make up his mind about something, "Granpabbie probably won't like me telling you this, but I feel like I owe you for accusing you of murder. Several years ago, Sven and I were just coming back from ice harvesting, when two horses came rushing past us… one of them trailing frost. Well, even when I was younger I was fascinated by ice, so I had Sven follow, and it led to the clearing. Standing in the clearing were four people, a man and a woman, who Pabbie later told me were the King and Queen, carrying someone, and a young girl with blonde hair; the same color as the streak in your hair. Anyway, the King called out to Pabbie, and Pabbie went over to who I now guess was you and did something. I don't know exactly what, but apparently you had ice in your head and he removed it."

Anna blanched at that, "I had ice _in_ my head? How did _that_ happen?"

Kristoff shrugged, "I have no idea, but Pabbie removed it, and showed who I guess is your sister something pretty intense, and then the four of you left. The next time I was in Arendelle, the gates had been closed and no one had any idea why."

Anna thought hard; she had always dreamed that she had gotten her streak by being kissed by a troll, even though her parents had told her she had been born with it. Now, however, Anna didn't know what to think. She had so many questions she needed answered; why had her head been frozen, what had Pabbie shown Elsa, and did it have anything to do with why everyone shut her out? And why had one of the horses been trailing ice? Anna sighed, she wasn't going to get any answers any time soon, but maybe this Granpabbie could help her find answers of her own. Deciding that thinking about this wasn't going to solve anything, she changed the subject.

"If you want to fight someone," she began with a sly smile, "you should probably have your knees more bent than they were, gives you more control."

"And you would know that how?" asked Kristoff skeptically, and Anna just chuckled.

"I've been in my fare share of tavern brawls, so I know my way around a fight." She said simply.

Kristoff smiled, "if I recall correctly, I got you back there, so you're not as good as you think."

Anna scowled playfully at him and retorted, "You just got lucky; if I hadn't been holding back, I would have beaten you without having my hood fall off."

"Wanna bet?" he asked with a grin, "five coins to the winner?"

Anna's grin widened, "you're on, mountain man!"

When one of the trolls came out to get them, the both of them were rolling in the dirt, with Gawain and Chatterbox, cheering her on, and it even appeared the reindeer was cheering Kristoff on. The troll shook her head, with an exasperated look and cleared her throat loudly. The two of them stopped mid grapple, and quickly got up, each brushing their clothes off while trying to hide their blush.

"You're better than I thought, I'll give you that," Kristoff muttered to her, and Anna had to smile.

Having a sudden bout of inspiration, she reached into her coin purse, and pulled out a few coins, and handed them to Kristoff. The boy blinked and looked at her confused.

"It was a draw," he protested, but Anna shook her head.

"To replace what Chatterbox took." She explained, and he smiled and took the coins with a grateful nod. Then he reached into his pack and pulled out a moss green knit cap, and held it out to her, "to hide your hair, in case your hood gets thrown again."

When they returned to the clearing, every one of the rocks had unrolled to reveal a troll, each one of them waiting patiently for the four of them (five including Sven) to approach.

"I… I will do this for you," said Granpabbie, with a look of sad resignation, "and I am sorry that such action is necessary."

Anna gave the old troll a look of gratitude, "Thank you Pabbie," she said sincerely, "and I'm sorry that this is needed as well. But, could I ask you one last question?"

The troll eyed her and said, "You may, though I do not know if I will be able to answer."

Anna pointed to her blond streak, "Does this have anything with why Elsa shut me out?"

Granpabbie sighed and slowly nodded, "dear Anna, it has _everything_ to do with it. That is all I can tell you. As for your doppelganger, I will use my magic to give her your likeness, enough to fool the castle physician, it will take several months but hopefully it will end this man hunt for you."

Anna smiled softly, "Thank you."

She turned to leave, but the old troll stopped her, "If there ever is anything you may need that might require my talents, I will do my best to help you… Anna."

She nodded, "Thank you, and don't worry. We won't tell anyone about you guys, right?" she nudged the other two, and Chatterbox and Gawain nodded, "Of course not, your existence is safe with us. You have our word."

With these words, the trolls and humans said their goodbyes, and the three pirates left for their ship.

* * *

**I. Hate. Finals. Seriously, they are **_**the worst**_**.**

**On a side note, I am very glad that my muse decided to return (why it was hiding in a farmers market is beyond me). Hopefully it will decide to stick around this time. Please Review, Follow, and Favorite… all that jazz.**

**Also, in case it wasn't clear enough, it is stated in the movie that Anna dreamt about getting her blonde streak by being kissed by a troll, so it's possible she would remember the troll clearing if given enough time, and possibly Granpabbie himself.**

**-Peace Out-**

**BNI**


	12. AN: Bad Luck

Hello everyone! BatteriezNotIncluded here;

If you haven't looked at my profile page, then you don't know that not only did my internet deside to bite the dust, but my computer did as well, taking nearly all of my stories with it. I luckily saved the outlines of each story in a separate place, but the story content, I'm going to have to wing it. If anything take this as an explanation as to why no updates have been forthcoming, and as an apology for taking so long to let you guy's know what was going on.

I'm going to try to see if the memory of my computer is even remotely salvageable, so I won't have to wing it as much. Wish me luck!

-Peace out-


	13. AN: Well Shit

I lost everything.

The entire file has been corrupted so that the entire file is formatted so that all the letters are asterisks. Therefore, this fic will be going on a hiatus until I can rewrite everything I need to.

:-(

Sorry for the inconvenience,

-BatteriezNotIncluded


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